Timely recoveries crucial for profitability of sale-bound IDBI Bank, says Icra, BFSI News, ET BFSI
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“IDBI Bank’s profitability includes one-time income driven by recoveries from fully-provided legacy stressed assets, and it has utilised the same for accelerated provisioning on other stressed assets and potential asset quality stress in future. Incremental slippages could remain high, given the reasonably large overdue book amid the weak operating environment and certain other vulnerable exposures, the rating agency said in a note while upgrading the rating for the Mumbai-based private lender’s bonds, debentures and tier-II capital instruments from “A” to “A+”
While the bank maintains one of the highest provision coverage ratios on its stressed assets, the timing of recoveries from these could remain uncertain, it said.
The rating upgrade
The rating upgrade factors in the sustained improvement in the credit profile of IDBI Bank Limited with expectations that the internal capital generation is likely to be sufficient for growth as well as for maintaining sufficient cushion over the regulatory capital requirements.
Due to the weak asset quality and capitalisation levels in the past, IDBI Bank was placed under the Prompt Corrective Action (PCA) framework, thereby placing curbs on fresh wholesale lending. This, coupled with increased provision levels on NPAs, resulted in a sustained decline in the net advances to Rs. 1.23 lakh crore as on June 30, 2021 from the peak level of Rs. 2.19 lakh crore as on September 30, 2016. In contrast, the bank’s deposit base moderated less sharply to Rs. 2.23 lakh crore as on June 30, 2021, from Rs. 2.66 lakh crore as on September 30, 2016, that too driven by bulk deposits.
NPA generation
The bank has guided towards the normalisation of NPA generation at 2.0-2.5% in FY2022. However, this will remain contingent on its ability to contain incremental slippages, even as the overdue book, as indicated by the special mention account (SMA)-1 and SMA-2 book (corporate book and retail book combined), remained high at 3.6% of standard advances as on June 30, 2021 (3.3% as on March 31, 2021 and 3.4% as on March 31, 2020).
On a forward-looking basis, normalised operating profitability is expected to remain better compared to past levels although elevated operational costs on a reduced scale along with the continued impact of the high share of low/non-yielding assets on profitability will continue to weigh down the operating profitability, the rating agency said.
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