Bank stocks suffered a mauling in markets on Monday with private sector banks too being singed by the sustained selling. The sentiment was not only affected by the overall weakness in the market but also apparently by the Q3 results by some of the banks that revealed higher net NPAs, raising the spectre of bad loans ballooning for the sector as a whole.
The fact that the third quarter (Q3) results of two banking heavyweights — ICICI Bank and Punjab National Bank — are due on Tuesday also raised some anxiety among the investors as to what surprises they may spring. However, three bank stocks — Union Bank of India, HDFC Bank and IDBI Bank — escaped any serious erosion in value.
100% rise
The banks that came out with Q3 numbers on the day — Oriental Bank of Commerce, Indian Bank, Punjab & Sind Bank and Allahabad Bank — showed that theirs net NPAs had zoomed, in some cases by 100 per cent compared to the corresponding period last year, which spooked the bank counters.
The weakness the markets suffered ahead of crucial EU meeting later in the day further added to the selling pressure these counters witnessed.
In the case of Indian Bank, the net NPA jumped to Rs 695.31 crore in Q3 this year compared to Rs 417.19 crore in the same period last year. As a percentage, the net NPA was higher at 0.80 per cent compared to 0.57 per cent in the same quarter last year. However, the bank had posted a higher net profit for the quarter ending December 31, 2011 at Rs 525.92 crore compared to Rs 491.29 crore for the quarter ending December 31, 2010. The stock closed at Rs 211.05, a loss of Rs 7.10, with a trading volume of 8.21 lakh shares.
Bucks trend
Punjab & Sind Bank saw the doubling of the net NPA to 0.88 per cent in the past quarter compared to 0.44 per cent in the same quarter last year.
Allahabad Bank too saw the percentage of net NPAs moving up to 0.79 per cent (0.59 per cent). But the share escaped any steep erosion in value, shedding just Rs 2 to close at Rs 154.85 with a huge trading volume (41.75 lakh shares).
The net NPA percentage of OBC in Q3 of this year also had doubled to 1.89 per cent compared to 0.91 per cent in the same period last year. The share closed at Rs 249.55, down by Rs 9.80 with 12.48 lakh shares being traded.
In terms of value, the biggest losers among the Bank Nifty were SBI, Axis Bank and ICICI Bank. While SBI lost Rs 68.60 to close at Rs 1,972, Axis Bank shed Rs 52.05 to end the day at Rs 1,021, and ICICI Bank was down by Rs 37.15 at Rs 850.80.
But Union Bank lost just 55 paise at Rs 214.50, HDFC Bank was down by Rs 4.75 at Rs 479.75 and IDBI shed Rs 3.50 at Rs 97.20.