Outlook on NPAs?:

Q4 gross NPA and net NPA performance, we had strong recovery, we had limited slippage and even if we had not sold a part of our gross NPA to asset reconstruction, our gross NPA would have been 1.92 percent which would have been lower than last quarter which was 1.98 percent and net NPA would have been 1.01 percent. So, we sold about Rs 58 crore, about 37 accounts to asset reconstruction company; that also helped further improve the asset quality. The reason why our asset quality had been stable is because we are focused on retail and SME banking.

Corporate banking is only 15 percent of our total approximate Rs 13,000 crore exposure. In fact corporate banking has fallen by about 20 percent this year. Even in the limited corporate loans, we have two-three accounts which continue to show some stress. One or two commodity accounts are showing some stress. However, all in all we are confident that if you continue to focus on our asset quality and remain faithful to our strategy of retail and SME banking and small ticket, asset quality should remain stable.

Update on UPI?:

In UPI, we are amongst the top banks that have enabled in the first place itself on UPI, so, we are UPI ready. How it will pan out, time only will tell. It is a path breaking technology that has been launched by NPCI. I would also like to point out that DCB Bank recently was the first bank to have Aadhaar enabled ATM. We have done a pilot launch in our 9th floor office for staff and some select customers. So, we are making tremendous amount of efforts to be on the cutting edge on technology.

Loan book growth in the first half of FY17?:

If you see consistently we have been growing at 20 percent plus on the loan book. If you see our press release announcement, without conserving corporate bank on both years, retail, SME, agri inclusive banking has actually grown by 36 percent. We are concentrating on small customers, we are concentrating on mortgage, we are concentrating on secured lending; that is where the growth is coming from. Plus we have put in a lot of effort, last year our staff strength was about 3,300, we ended this year at about 4,300. So, there is a lot of capacity getting built. We were at 160 so we ended at about 198 and then we inaugurated our 200th branch on April 15th in Hyderabad. So, we are now at 200 branches. So, as we grow branches and capacity on frontline, we expect growth momentum to continue.

NIMs going forwrd? :

The Q4 recoveries were very strong, slippages were in control. We have already launched our marginal Cost of Funds based Lending Rate (MCLR) which is slightly lower than our base rate. Competition is very tough. I don’t expect us to maintain this kind of NIM. There would be pressure on NIMs to the extent of about 25 basis points in the coming quarters.

New branches?:
We are opening branches predominantly in semi-urban rural areas. 50 percent of our new additions are coming in those areas. It takes about approximately 18- 22 months to achieve full break-even on any new branch and it takes about 36-40 months to achieve say 50-55 percent cost income ratio on a new branch. It takes a lot of effort because you have to put in training efforts, you have to hire the right team, you have to find the right location. So, we are getting better and better at it so as long as our execution is as good as it has been in the past, we expect that we should be able to grow.