UCO Bank Q4 net up by 12%

Public sector UCO Bank Saturday said it has registered a 12 per cent growth in its net profit to Rs 2.53 billion (Rs 252.84 crore) during the quarter ended March 31, 2012, from Rs 2.26 billion (Rs 225.9 crore) in the same period last year.

The total income of the Kolkata-headquartered bank during the fourth quarter under review has increased to Rs 42.17 billion (Rs 4217 crore) from Rs 33.6 billion (Rs 3360 crore) during the same quarter previous fiscal.

The bank has posted a net profit of Rs 11.09 billion (Rs 1,109 crore) for the year ended March 31, 2012 as compared to Rs 9.07 billion (Rs 970 crore ) for the year ended March 31, 2011.

"The profits would have been more but for higher provisioning for non-performing assets of Rs 379 crore during the fourth quarter, as against Rs 94 crore during same period last year," UCO Bank chairman and managing director Arun Kaul said.

Kaul said in the last fiscal, the bank had posted a credit growth of 16.85 per cent.

"For the full (fiscal) year the bank's credit growth is 16.85 per cent, deposit growth is 6.06 per cent. We have deliberately grown slowly on deposit growth because the bank has historically been dependent substantially on deposit growth. We have contained the growth of bulk deposits and focused more on core deposits," he said.

"We are putting major emphasis on retail side growth…it is in this regard that we have opened a lot of branches," he stated.

On asset side, Kaul said the bank was trying to reduce its dependence on bulk corporate credits and pushing more on retail credits like agriculture and SMEs.

"We want to de-risk the balance sheet by reducing our exposure to big accounts," said bank executive director N.R. Badrinarayanan.

Badrinarayanan said more than 60 per cent of the banks' total advances lie in the corporate sector at present, while retail accounts for a miniscule 8.5 per cent.