Tag: RBI restriction

After HDFC Bank, it may be the turn of other private sector banks including ICICI Bank, IndusInd Bank, Axis Bank and Yes Bank to skip dividends for the second year in a row.

HDFC Bank, the country’s most valuable lender, has already announced its stand that it will skip dividends.

As Covid cases surge and ravage the economy, cash conservation would be the foremost on the agenda of banks, which are likely to see huge defaults.

Dividend payments

Last year the Reserve Bank of India had barred banks from paying dividends for the fiscal year ended March 2020 so that they conserve capital in view of the economic shock caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

In his address, which included other policy measures, RBI governor Shaktikanta Das said the ban on dividend payment will help banks conserve capital.

“It is imperative that banks conserve capital to retain their capacity to support the economy and absorb losses in an environment of heightened uncertainty,” Das said.

“It has, therefore, been decided that in view of the Covid-19-related economic shock, scheduled commercial banks and cooperative banks shall not make any further dividend payouts from profits pertaining to the financial year ended March 31, 2020 until further instructions.” Though there is no RBI restriction yet on dividend payments, banks are likely to skip payments this year too to conserve cash.

In respect to dividend payments, Yes Bank, and HDFC Bank are ahead of other banks. Their dividend yields since FY2011 are in the range of 0.65-1.93%. Banks including Axis, IndusInd, ICICI come next in line in rewarding investors.

For HDFC Bank, this is the first time in the last one decade at least that the lender, of its own, did not offer any dividend. Even in FY20, it had offered an interim dividend before the RBI barred banks from announcing dividends.

Acute stress

Given the second Covid wave all over the country, non-performing assets (NPAs) or bad loans of public sector banks (PSBs) could cross 18 per cent if there is deterioration in economic activity due to the pandemic, former RBI deputy governor has H R Khan said.

As per the Financial Stability Report released by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the NPAs of the banking sector were projected to surge to 13.5 per cent of advances by September 2021, from 7.5 per cent in September 2020, under the baseline scenario.

The report had warned that if the macroeconomic environment worsens into a severe stress scenario, the NPA ratio may escalate to 14.8 per cent.

With regard to public sector banks, Khan said the latest Financial Stability Report indicates that NPAs can go up to 16 per cent in severe case scenario but extreme case scenario has not been portrayed this time.
“Given the second wave all over the country, I think the extreme case scenario is something which one has to factor in. So, 18-20 per cent NPL (non-performing loan) is not ruled out for public sector banks.

“So, systemic risk is something which the government does not want to take upon its shoulder,” he said.

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