INDIA: ICICI Bank Ltd, India's third-largest lender by assets, said its fourth-quarter net profit almost halved, missing expectations, as provisions for bad loans surged.
Gross bad loans as a percentage of total loans stood at 8.84 percent at the end of March compared with 7.82 percent at the end of the previous quarter and 7.89 percent a year earlier.
Net profit for the three months to March 31 fell to 10.20 billion rupees ($151.94 million) from 20.25 billion rupees a year earlier, the bank said in a statement.
That compared with the average 10.77 billion rupees forecast of 12 analysts, according to Thomson Reuters data.
Net interest income for the quarter was up 1 percent on the year to 60.22 billion rupees, while net interest margin was at 3.24 percent.
Shares of the Mumbai-based lender, which started trading in 1998, ended 2.5 percent higher ahead of the results, outperforming a slightly higher main market. ($1 = 67.1300 Indian rupees.
Comments
Comments are closed for this article.