SME, core sector lending to help SBI turn around

​Hyderabad: SME and core sector lending will help SBI to turnaround by September-end if not by year-end said Rajnish Kumar, Chairman, State Bank of India.

Kumar was in the city to participate in various corporate social responsibility activities organised by SBI, Hyderabad circle including donations to Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation, government hospital and also for tribal welfare.

Talking to reporters, Kumar said, “We are expecting a 10 per cent credit growth in FY19 as we foresee lending picking up in consumer loans for cars, homes and personal loans,” and added, “We hope to bounce back into profits from the current quarter as the major chunk of provisioning for bad loans was done in the first quarter.” The bank has 32 per cent share in home loans and 35 per cent market share in auto loans.

The bank which posted a net loss of Rs 4,230 crore on a consolidated basis as against a profit of Rs 3,032 crore earlier suffered a huge loss of Rs 4,876 crore for Q1 due to bad loans.

The total provisions more than doubled to Rs 19,228 crore for Q1 from Rs 8,929.48 crore in Q1 of FY18. Gross advances crossed the Rs 20 lakh crore mark and grew at 4.91 per cent to Rs 20,48,387 crore by March 2018 from the previous year's level of Rs 19,52,507 crore. Being the largest bank in the state of Telangana, the bank has 1,144 branches with a total business of Rs 1.92 crore with a market share of 29.61 per cent in deposits and 14.02 per cent in loans, he added.