The Managing Director and CEO of Karnataka Bank Ltd, P Jayarama Bhat, has stressed upon the need for credit growth and for increasing the penetration of digital banking products and services during the current quarter.

Speaking at the review conference of the regional heads of the bank in Mangaluru on Monday, Bhat said that while the third quarter of 2016-17 witnessed a surge in deposits, particularly CASA (current account savings account), the current quarter’s focus shall be on profitable deployment of funds through effective credit augmentation, effective credit monitoring to prevent slippages, and on recovery of non-performing assets.

He also urged the need to focus on augmenting fee-based income by effective marketing of bancassurance and other para-banking products. He said that the penetration of alternate delivery channels and digital banking products and services should be increased.

Mahabaleshwara MS, Chief General Manager of the bank, said that the overall business growth of the bank during the first nine months of 2016-17 was 10.5 per cent (including deposit growth of 12.5 per cent and advances growth of 5.8 per cent).

Banking industry witnessed an overall business growth of 7.8 per cent (including deposit growth of 12.7 per cent and advances growth of 1.4 per cent) during the period, he said.

Published on January 30, 2017