Mumbai : Country’s largest lender State Bank of India reported a 5.97 % rise in its consolidated net profit at Rs 4,714 crore in the quarter to June, helped by lower bad loan provisioning and healthy rise in other income.
On standalone basis, net profit rose by a higher 10.25 % at Rs 3,692 crore, driven by a robust jump in treasury and investment income that rose 19.66 % to Rs 5,088 crore, out of which fee income contributed Rs 3,202 crore, up 12.86 %. SBI Chairperson Arundhati Bhattacharya sounded optimistic on the asset quality front, saying the worst is sort of behind the bank.
“Overall, the stress picture is much better and with some amount of confidence I can say the recovery is having a beneficial impact in the books,” she told reporters while announcing the numbers. While loan loss provisions fell by 14 % to Rs 3,359 crore from Rs 3,903 crore last year, total provisions increased marginally by 1.31 % to Rs 5,510 crore from Rs 5,439 crore in the year-ago period, she said.
CFO and deputy MD Anshula Kant attributed the good set of numbers to “the growth in net interest income which rose 3.6 %, other income has gone up by 20 % and also as on lower loan loss provisions.” Kant said domestic net interest margin (NIM) declined to 3.29 per cent from 3.54 per cent due to reduction in base rate by 30 basis points.
