Five PSU banks post loss Rs 2,564 cr in Q1

PTI

Saddled with rising bad loans, five public sector banks, including Bank of India, Dena Bank, and Central Bank of India, on Friday posted a combined loss of Rs 2,564 crore for the first quarter ended June.

Meanwhile, the country's largest lender SBI witnessed a 78 per cent drop in consolidated profit to Rs 1,046 crore against Rs 4,714 crore profit in the same quarter a year ago.

Oriental Bank of Commerce (OBC) too reported 61 per cent decline in net profit at Rs 100.69 crore as against Rs 257.84 crore in the corresponding April-June quarter of 2015-16.

Leading the pack, Bank of India reported a loss of Rs 741.3 crore as provisions for bad loans nearly doubled.

Provisions and contingencies nearly doubled to Rs 277 crore as against Rs 151 crore in the year-ago period.

As on June 30, the bank's gross non-performing assets (NPAs) increased to 13.38 per cent of advances as against 6.80 per cent in the corresponding quarter of last fiscal.

BOI was followed by Central Bank of India registering a net loss of Rs 600 crore as against a net profit of Rs 203.6 crore in the April-June quarter of last fiscal.

Provision for bad loans witnessed over two-fold rise to Rs 1,543.65 crore as against Rs 580.75 crore in the year-ago period.

Bank of Maharashtra posted loss of Rs 397.40 crore for April-June as its provisions almost doubled to Rs 842.50 crore for the quarter, from Rs 483.91 crore a year earlier.

At the same time, Dena Bank had to book a loss of Rs 279.35 crore.

The gross NPAs of the Dena Bank nearly doubled to 11.88 per cent, as against 6.20 per cent a year ago. In value terms, they were Rs 9,636.32 crore versus Rs 4,840.70 crore respectively.

Allahabad Bank reported a loss of Rs 564.9 crore for the first quarter due to two-fold jump in provision and contingencies to Rs 1330.7 crore from Rs 854.7 crore in the year-ago period.