Federal Bank looks at 20% credit growth

Kolkata, March 20 (IANS) Private sector lender Federal Bank, which is hoping to end the current financial year with a 25 per cent credit growth, is eyeing 20 per cent growth in the next fiscal, an official said on Monday.

"Our credit growth up to December was 32 per cent and we are expecting to touch 25 per cent credit growth by March. We are looking at 20 per cent (credit) growth on a higher base in 2018," said the bank's Managing Director and CEO Shyam Srinivasan here.

The lender's deposits base stood at Rs 93,000 crore while its credit book was at Rs 70,000 crore by the end of December, he said.

The bank's performance, so far in the current fiscal, was good in terms of mobilising deposits, Srinivasan said while announcing e-POS and Lotza UPI merchant services.

Gross non-performing assets (NPA) stood at 2.7 per cent of its total advances.

"We have not dealt with clients of riskier nature for many years. We are quite conservative and that has gone well for the bank," he said.

At this point, the bank has no plan for borrowing from the market but it may seek capital if the current rate of growth continues.

According to Srinivasan, the lender, with the ongoing credit growth, is expecting to touch about one per cent of India's credit book by the end of March.

The bank currently has 1,252 branches and two representative offices -- one each in Abu Dhabi and Dubai.