Canara Bank Eyes 8% To 10% Loan Growth; Rise In Corporate Credit This Fiscal

State-owned Canara Bank is expecting an 8-10 per cent growth in advances, as well as a healthy double-digit rise in the corporate loan portfolio in the current financial year, its Managing Director and CEO L V Prabhakar, said on Monday.

In the fiscal ended on March 31, 2022, the lender's gross advances grew by 9.77 per cent.

"Last year (FY22), we had targeted a loan growth of 7.5 per cent and closed the year at 9.77 per cent. For FY23, we have given guidance of a minimum growth of 8 per cent. However, going with the present trend, we expect that we will grow at 10 per cent," Prabhakar told PTI in an interaction.

"Overall we are targeting that by March 2023 our balance sheet size will be more than Rs 20 lakh crore as compared to Rs 18.27 lakh crore today," he said.

The bank's Retail, Agriculture, and MSME (RAM) segment, which constitutes 57 per cent of its total loan book, rose by 10.94 per cent in the previous fiscal. Within RAM, retail grew by 9.51 per cent, agriculture by 12.75 per cent and MSME by 9.87 per cent.

The corporate loan book, which witnessed a growth of 8.27 per cent in FY22, is expected to grow at 10 per cent. The bank is seeing good traction in its corporate loan portfolio and has a pipeline of Rs 65,000-70,000 crore.

"We are getting a lot of inquiries as far as infrastructure, renewable energy, and manufacturing sectors are concerned. At least we are having about Rs 65,000-70,000 crore of corporate loan proposals with us for appraisal. Already, we have underwritten Hybrid Annuity Mode (HAM) projects worth Rs 35,000 crore, which will be disbursed in the current year," he said.

On the capital raising plan, Prabhakar said with a reduction in risk-weighted assets to 72 per cent from 78 per cent earlier and higher Capital to Risk-weighted Assets Ratio (CRAR) at 14.90 per cent, the requirement for capital has also reduced.

"As of now, we don't require any capital but to be future-ready, we will be raising at an appropriate time taking into consideration the yields," he said, adding that the bank will look to raise Rs 9,000 crore through issuance of additional tier I and tier-II bonds in the latter part of the fiscal.

In the quarter ended March 31, 2022, the bank's Profit After Tax (PAT) jumped by 64.9 per cent to Rs 1,666 crore from Rs 1,010 crore in the year-ago period. Net Interest Income (NII) grew by 24.84 per cent to Rs 7,005 crore. NIM improved to 2.82 per cent from 2.76 per cent.

The bank saw its asset quality improving with Gross Non-Performing Assets (GNPAs) ratio declining to 7.51 per cent from 8.93 per cent. The net NPA ratio stood at 2.65 per cent compared to 3.82 per cent.

"In FY23, our net NPAs will be less than 2 per cent and gross NPAs at 6 per cent," Prabhakar said.

Slippage ratio will be below 1.75 per cent in FY23 and the bank is expecting recoveries of more than Rs 15,000 crore this fiscal.

 The lender's exposure to Future Retail is Rs 1,400 crore and it has already recovered Rs 227 crore from the loan account, Prabhakar said. The bank has already made a provision of 60 per cent for the account.