Growth across all segments boosts Axis Bank profit in Q2

Mumbai, Oct 22: Axis Bank reported a 25 per cent increase in net profit to Rs 920 crore in the July-September 2011 quarter against Rs 735 crore in the corresponding period last year. Growth across all segments of business helped the bank post good results, said Mr Somnath Sengupta, Executive Director and Chief Financial Officer, Axis Bank. Focus on core biz “This was a good quarter as growth was well balanced. We will focus on core business going ahead,'' he said. Credit growth will probably slow down for the banking sector, but Axis Bank will...

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PSBs extend home loan tenure up to 30 yrs

Fearing credit turning bad assets in the wake of high interest rates, a number of state-run banks, led by State Bank of India (SBI), have decided to raise home loan tenures to 25-30 years or till the borrower touches 70 --well past their working age. Earlier, the Finance Ministry had written to all public sector banks to increase the tenure of loans instead of raising EMIs in the light of rising interest rates. SBI took the lead and has reportedly decided to extend the tenure of home loans by 10 years or up to 30 years, while others are doing this...

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Central Bank to open 101 branches on single day

Pune, Oct. 21: The Central Bank of India will open 101 new branches across the country on December 21, 2011 to mark completion of 100 years of its existence. The bank also plans to open new ATMs to take their number all over India to 2011, Mr Mohan Vasant Tanksale, Chairman & Managing Director of the bank, said. On his maiden visit to its Pune Zonal Office, Mr Tanksale said that the western part of Maharashtra held vast potential for increasing business. More customer-friendly products and facilities are in the pipeline and will be launched...

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IDBI Bank scouting for partners to float infra debt fund

Mumbai, Oct. 21: Public sector lender IDBI Bank is in talks with various financial institutions, including other state-owned banks, to float an infrastructure debt fund, a top official has said. “We are in talks with various financial institutions to float an infrastructure debt fund after the recent approval of the Reserve Bank allowing banks to launch such funds,” Executive Director, Mr Melwyn Rego, told PTI here. He, however, declined to name the institutions, or give information about the corpus of the proposed fund. However, sources said the...

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PNB to offer discounts on gold coins

New Delhi, Oct. 21: As part of its ongoing festive season campaign, Punjab National Bank (PNB) has decided to offer discounts on the gold coins sold by it. The quantum of discount would depend upon the weight of the coins purchased, Ms Usha Ananthasubramanian, Executive Director, PNB, said in a statement....

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SBI to decide on overseas bonds issue shortly

Mumbai, Oct 21: State Bank of India, which was downgraded by ratings agency Moody’s recently, on Friday said it will decide on an over $500 million bonds issue next month. “That’s a call we would be taking in November...whether to go for it at all, and if we do decide to go in, then the extent of the amount,” said Mr Hemand Contractor, Managing Director for International Banking. He said it would be a “benchmark issue”, which normally means the minimum issue size would be at least $ 500million. The bank had earlier announced that it would double...

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Central Bank launches direct taxes payment facility

New Delhi, Oct. 21:Central Bank of India has launched a direct taxes payment facility through the bank's ATM network. This facility was inaugurated by Mr C. R. Sundaramurti, Controller General of Accounts, at the bank's Connaught Circus branch in the Capital on Thursday. Speaking on the occasion, Mr Sundaramurti urged banks to provide IT-enabled services so as to make banking a hassle-free experience for all. Mr M. V. Tanksale, Chairman and Managing Director of the bank, and Executive Directors, Ms V. R. Iyer and Mr R. K. Dubey were present on...

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Credit card fraud: HDFC duped of Rs 35 lakh

New Delhi: ‘They floated fictitious firms, roped in man who conducted credit card verification for the bank’ Eight persons were arrested by the Delhi Crime Branch for their alleged role in carrying out a credit card fraud operation from Prashant Vihar. The accused persons, divided into two gangs, reportedly siphoned off close to Rs 35 lakh from leading private banks, police said. “Sunder Kumar, Vikas Malik, Jitender Gulati, Raj Karan, Paramjit Singh, Ashok Kumar, Pramod Kumar and Hari Prakash were arrested on Wednesday following a complaint by...

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SBI, Central Bank, Syndicate, Canara extend home loan tenor upto 30 years as rate hikes bite hard

MUMBAI: After goading by the Government and fearing risks to asset quality, a number of state-run banks, led by SBI, Central Bank, Syndicate and Canara, have decided to raise home loan tenors to 25 to 30 years or till the borrower touches 70, well past the working age. State Bank of India took the lead and has reportedly decided to extend the tenor of home loans by 10 years or up to 30 years, while others are doing this on request. "We have decided to increase the home loan tenure by up to 10 years to 30 years and up to the age of 70, depending...

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PNB completes formalities to buy 30% in Metlife

Punjab National Bank, the country's second-largest public lender, today said it had completed formalities to acquire 30% stake in MetLife and launch of insurance policies is slated to begin on January 14 next year across the country, pending regulatory approval. "We have completed formalities to acquire 30% stake in Metlife. The launch of insurance business is expected on January 14, 2012, and we expect Rs 100 crore business by selling Metlife life insurance polices in one year," PNB Chairman and Managing Director KR Kamath said. Asked why Q2 results...

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RBI may hike rates by 25 bps on Tuesday: RBS

The Reserve Bank of India is likely to go in for another round of rate hike of 25 basis points (bps) when it meets on Tuesday, and then will pause till March, according to a poll by the British lender RBS. The 10th edition of RBS Clients' Survey, which is the third this fiscal, covered 103 local market participants, including corporates, banks, insurers and mutual funds among others. "...An overwhelming majority of 67% are sure of a 25 bps hike in the repo rate, and then the RBI pause till March," said RBS India Managing Director & Head, Markets,...

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Mobile, Internet, e-banking - the way to go

In tune with the times, the Thiruvananthapuram-headquartered State Bank of Travancore is setting great store by mobile and Internet-based banking as well as harnessing the e-platform to executing Government business. Mr P. Nanda Kumaran, who has taken over Managing Director in recent times, says that the mobile banking services are steadily gaining traction and monthly registrations have touched ‘the five-digit mark' over the last three months, compared to the sub-1,000 levels a month earlier. More importantly, the value of mobile-based transactions...

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YES Bank Q2 net climbs 33%

Mumbai, Oct 20: YES Bank’s net profit increased 33 per cent to Rs 235 crore in the second quarter ended September 30, 2011 from Rs 176 crore in the corresponding quarter last year. A strong growth of 23 per cent in net interest income and a huge increase of 63 per cent in non interest income helped the bank post good growth during the second quarter, said a press release from the bank. Total advances rose 13 per cent to Rs 34,194 crore, while deposits rose 10 per cent to Rs 44,076 crore. The huge growth in non interest income was on the back of...

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IDBI Bank to offer loans against IDBI gold ETF

New Delhi, Oct 20: IDBI Mutual Fund is in talks with five major jewellery houses to enable investors to exchange their IDBI Gold ETF units for gold jewellery, a top official of the fund house has said. If successful, investors in IDBI Gold ETFs will be able to directly buy physical gold jewellery from a jeweller without having to go to a stock exchange for selling their units. “Some really big jewellery houses have in principle agreed to take our IDBI Gold ETF units and exchange it for gold jewellery. That will be an additional exit option for...

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Daimler India, HDFC Bank tie-up for commercial vehicle financing

Mumbai, Oct. 20: Daimler India Commercial Vehicles (DICV) has tied up with HDFC Bank for financing its commercial vehicles. The MoU was signed in the presence of Mr Marc Llistosella, Managing Director and CEO, DICV, and Mr Aditya Puri, Managing Director, HDFC Bank. The first preferred financier for BharatBenz trucks, HDFC Bank will now evaluate the finance needs of the clients and develop appropriate financing packages for BharatBenz customers. “This partnership is another big step as we move towards the market launch of our BharatBenz Trucks.  This...

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SBT H1 net down 18.25% on higher provisions

Thiruvananthapuram, Oct. 20: State Bank of Travancore has posted a negative growth of 18.25 per cent in net profit during the first half of 2011-12 compared to the corresponding year-ago period. A meeting of the board of directors held here on Thursday took on record the performance of the bank during and up to the end of the second quarter. HIGHER PROVISIONS The net profit for the half-year stands at Rs 256.20 crore against Rs 313.40 crore for the half year ended 30th September 2010. The net profit has been impacted by higher provisions for standard...

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Dhanlaxmi Bank net more than doubles in Q2

Mumbai, Oct. 20:Dhanlaxmi Bank's net profit more than doubled to Rs 4.35 crore in the quarter ended September 30, 2011, from Rs 1.62 crore in the same period last year. The surge in profit was on the back of strong growth in net interest income (Rs 68 crore) and other income (Rs 44 crore), healthy recovery in bad assets (Rs 17 crore) and write-back in provisioning (Rs 5.30 crore). Gross NPAs were lower at Rs 56 crore (Rs 90 crore) and the gross NPA ratio fell substantially to 0.55 per cent (1.26 per cent). The lower NPA has helped the bank to improve...

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SBI's net interest margin will be over 3.5% this fiscal, says MD

Kolkata, Oct. 20:State Bank of India hopes to achieve a net interest margin (NIM) of over 3.5 per cent in the second quarter as well as for the whole year. The rise in margins will be despite the pressure on interest rates, said its Managing Director and Chief Financial Officer, Mr Diwakar Gupta. “We had given a guidance of maintaining our margins at 3.5 per cent this year. We have shown a healthy growth in NIM so far and hope to do better than what we had targeted at the beginning of the year,” Mr Gupta told newspersons on the sidelines of a banking...

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RBI norms for new bank licences likely by Nov-end: FinMin

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is likely to come out with guidelines on allowing new private banks by November end, Financial Services Secretary DK Mittal said today. "The RBI is actively working on the guidelines...And is likely to come out with the final licencing norms by November," he told reporters on the sidelines of the Economic Editors conference here. The RBI had in August released the draft guidelines on allowing industrial houses to promote banks. As per the draft norms, private sector entities or groups owned and controlled by Indian...

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Festive season fails to boost growth in loans

The festive season has failed to cheer banks, with the growth in loans showing no signs of picking up, amid high interest rates. Credit growth, on a year-on-year basis, fell to 19.45 per cent from a high of 21.5 per cent during the beginning of the financial year. What makes matters worse is loans saw negative growth in the first week of October, falling by Rs 68,533 crore. Deposit growth, on the other hand, improved this financial year, standing at 17.36 per cent on a year-on-year basis. However, it fell by nearly Rs 83,000 in the first week of...

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Reserve Bank of India warns of another global financial crisis

MUMBAI: Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has warned of another financial crisis brewing, as global liquidity becomes a concern amidst central banks pegging their lending rates at near zero levels, leaving scope for another asset bubble to take down the global financial system. "There is, thus, incontrovertible evidence that there is yet again a huge under-pricing of risks in the financial system and, therefore, it is not a question of if, but when, the generic asset bubble caused by manifold increases in balance sheets of central banks will burst,"...

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Now, NRIs can hold accounts in any currency

Mumbai: The Reserve Bank today said Indians who have non-resident accounts in the country can now hold them in any currency which is fully convertible. The move is likely to help NRIs/Persons of India Origin as it will give them more options in the holding of accounts, and lessen the risk from fluctuations in major currencies. Earlier, FCNR(B) account holders were allowed to hold accounts in only certain currencies such as the Pound Sterling, US dollar, Japanese yen, euro, Canadian dollar and Australian dollar. "It has been decided that Authorised...

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Axis Bank to start Sri Lanka operations

COLOMBO: India's No.3 private lender Axis Bank has been granted a banking licence in Sri Lanka and will start operations at its first branch this week, the island nation's central bank said on Wednesday. Central Bank Governor Ajith Nivard confirmed Axis Bank is the fifth Indian bank licensed to operate in Sri Lanka. "They are starting on Friday and they will do all banking business. Initially they will open one branch and then they will have to make an application for anything they will want," Cabraal told Reuters. The bank posted a net profit...

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Federal Bank opens 66 new branches

KOCHI Alwaye-based Federal Bank has announced the opening of 66 new branches on Tuesday. Speaking to ET, CEO and MD Shyam Srinivasan, Federal Bank explained that the way forward for Federal Bank was to scale up on its strength in new territories. Of the new branches, 12 are in Gujarat, 10 in Karnataka, nine in Tamil Nadu and six in Maharashtra. Source: EconomicTi...

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RBI grants pan-India licence to J&K State Cooperative Bank for biz activities

SRINAGAR: The Reserve Bank of India has granted a licence to Jammu and Kashmir State Cooperative Bank to carry out business activities in any part of the country, an official spokesperson of the state government said today. Minister of State for Cooperatives, Finance & Planning Manohar Lal Sharma announced the grant of licence by the RBI at a high-level meeting of bank officers here yesterday, according to the spokesperson. "It is a matter of pride for the state to get the (RBI) licence for a public sector bank," Sharma said, expressing hope...

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