Punjab National Bank To Raise Up To Rs 6,000 Crore Via Bonds

New Delhi: State-owned Punjab National Bank (PNB) on Thursday said it proposes to raise up to Rs 6,000 crore through issuing bonds to fund business growth.

The lender's board has approved raising "Basel III compliant debt instrument-Perpetual Additional Tier I Capital bonds to the extent of Rs 3,000 crore and Tier-II bonds up to Rs 3,000 crore", PNB said in a regulatory filing.

The fund raising would be subject to availability of headroom in one or more tranches, it said.

As part of the capital raising plan, the bank also plans to sell its stake in some non-core businesses.

PNB is planning to list its housing finance firm, PNB Housing Finance, during the current fiscal.

The bank yesterday posted the highest loss by any public sector lender at Rs 5,367 crore for the fourth quarter ended March 31 on account of a huge surge in bad loans.

The second-largest public sector bank had a net profit of Rs 306.56 crore in the corresponding period of 2014-15.

The Gross Non-Performing Assets (NPAs) rose significantly to 12.9 per cent at the end of March 2016, from 6.55 per cent a year ago. The net NPAs too rose to 8.61 per cent against 4.06 per cent at March 2015.

In absolute terms, the gross NPAs of the bank nearly doubled to Rs 55,818 crore from the year-ago levels.

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