HDFC rides small-town housing boom

Housing Development Finance Corporation (HDFC), India’s largest mortgage lender, posted a 12 per cent increase in its October-December net profit, helped by strong demand for home loans from non-metros.HDFC posted a net profit of ?1,278 crore against ?1,140 crore in the year-ago period.Total income increased 15 per cent to ?6,020 crore while the loan book grew 19 per cent to ?1,92,266 crore.Mumbai-based HDFC caters mainly to the mid-income home buyer. Its average loan size is ?22 lakh. Apart from lending to the retail segment, HDFC also disburses...

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RBI unlikely to tinker with rates in Jan 28 policy review: BNP Paribas

BNP Paribas expects the Reserve Bank of India to keep policy rates unchanged in the January 28 policy review meeting.The RBI is likely to pause for the second time in a row, thanks to inflation based on both the wholesale price index (WPI) and the consumer price index (CPI) softening in December.But there is a strong chance of the central bank going in for 25 basis point hike in each of the subsequent two meetings, said Richard Iley, Chief Asia economist, BNP Paribas.BNP Paribas expects interest rates to remain elevated for the next two quarters....

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Kotak Bank Q3 net falls 6% as loan growth slows

Kotak Mahindra Bank saw its net profit drop 6 per cent to Rs 340 crore in the October-December quarter of this fiscal due to higher provisions and slower loan growth.“We have cautiously slowed our commercial vehicle and commercial equipment (CVCE) segment due to stress in asset quality. Without considering CECV, our loan growth was at 12 per cent year-on-year,” said Dipak Gupta, Joint Managing Director of the bank. CV segment hit The mid-size private sector bank’s CV segment witnessed de-growth of 26 per cent. Gupta said the CV segment is...

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IDBI Bank joins the credit card bandwagon

Nearly nine years after becoming a full-fledged commercial bank, IDBI Bank has decided to issue credit cards to its customers.The Mumbai-headquartered bank intends to issue around five lakh cards in three years — one lakh in the first year and two lakh cards each in the following two years.The public sector bank, which currently has a base of more than 10 million customers, will be issuing EMV (Europay, MasterCard and Visa) chip cards with magnetic stripes.EMV is a global security standard for microprocessor chip card technology. This ensures...

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RBI’s Anand Sinha demits office

With Anand Sinha relinquishing his charge as Deputy Governor on Monday, the Reserve Bank of India has re-allocated his portfolios among the remaining three Deputy Governors — K.C. Chakrabarty, H.R. Khan and Urjit Patel. Sinha was in-charge of eight departments, including Departments of Banking Operations and Development, Risk Management, Information Technology and Expenditure and Budgetary Control.Sinha was on an 11-month extension as he was dealing with the process of issue of new bank licences in the private sector. In the race for this top-level...

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Dewan Housing net up 52% in third quarter

Dewan Housing Finance Ltd (DHFL) reported a 52 per cent jump in net profit at Rs 138 crore due to healthy loan growth in the third quarter ending December 31, 2013.The housing finance company’s net profit in the corresponding quarter last year was Rs 91 crore.Housing loans sanctioned as on December 31, 2013, grew 51 per cent, while disbursements were up 35 per cent. The firm securitised housing and property loans aggregating Rs 502 crore.This quarter also witnessed some improvement in consumer sentiment and home buying on account of the festival...

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Banks can now lend up to 75% of value of pledged gold

The Reserve Bank of India on Monday allowed banks to lend more against pledged gold jewellery, thereby creating a level-playing field for them vis-à-vis gold loan companies. This move follows the central bank’s January 8 announcement that gold loan companies or non-banking finance companies (NBFCs) can lend up to 75 per cent of the value of pledged gold jewellery against the earlier 60 per cent. In a notification, the central bank said banks can lend up to 75 per cent of the value of pledged gold jewellery, including bullet repayment of loans....

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Federal Bank gets nod for hiking foreign investment limit

The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) has approved the proposal of Federal Bank for increase in foreign investment up to 74 per cent.This nod is, however, subject to the condition that aggregate Foreign Institutional Investors' shareholding will not exceed 49 per cent of the paid-up capital of the bank.The approval will result in a foreign investment of Rs 1,400 crore into the country, an official release said.Srivats.kr@thehindu.co.inSource: Thehindubusinesslin...

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RBI committee to review governance of bank boards

The Reserve Bank of India has constituted an expert committee to review the governance of bank boards in India.The committee will review the regulatory compliance requirements of the board of directors of banks, judge what can be rationalised and where requirements need enhancements, examine the working of the boards, including whether adequate time is being devoted to issues of strategy, growth, governance and risk management, the RBI said in a notification.The committee will review central bank regulatory guidelines on bank ownership, ownership...

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ICICI Bank to extend credit to MSMEs

ICICI Bank, the country’s largest private sector bank, has signed a memorandum of understanding with the National Small Industries Corporation (NSIC) to provide extended credit to the micro, medium and small sector enterprises.This MoU will promote availability of credit facilities for sustainable development of MSMEs.Under this agreement, the NSIC will share the proposals of its associated MSMEs for credit support to ICICI Bank. The bank, in turn, will offer credit and other tailored business solutions to these MSMEs as per its norms, the...

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‘No ATM levy for own customers’

HDFC Bank is not in favour of charging customers for using its own ATMs, according to Paresh Sukthankar, Deputy Managing Director. “Most banks have asked for a hike in charges. However, if the issue is left to the banks then we will not charge our own customers for using HDFC Bank ATMs,” Sukthankar said .The Indian Banks’ Association has approached the RBI to allow banks to levy charges on customers for ATM transactions. Currently, banks do not charge customers for using their own bank ATMs. Further, customers are allowed five free transactions...

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