Punjab National Bank third quarter net profit jumps four-fold to Rs 207.18 crore, bad loans stable

Indian banking major Punjab National Bank (PNB) on Tuesday reported over four-fold jump in net profit to Rs 207.18 crore for the third quarter ended December 31, 2016-17, on account of lower provisioning.

PNB had reported net profit of Rs 51.1 crore for the October-December quarter of the 2015-16 fiscal.

The public sector lender's total income increased 4.36 per cent to Rs 14,497.65 crore for the quarter under review, from Rs 13,891.2 crore in the year-ago period.
Its gross non-performing assets (NPAs) or bad loans, as a percentage to total advances, rose to 13.70 per cent from 8.47 per cent in the same quarter of last fiscal.

Net NPAs went up to 9.09 per cent from 5.86 per cent at the end of December 2015, the bank said.

Total provisions, excluding tax, made during the third quarter of 2016-17 stood at Rs 2,935.86 crore as against Rs 3,775.53 crore in the year-ago period, down 22.23 per cent.

Reacting to the bank's quarterly numbers, PNB's shares were trading 2.44 per cent higher to Rs 153.30 on BSE.