Bank of Maharashtra surges over 7% as Q3 profit more than doubles to Rs 775 crore

Shares of Bank of Maharashtra surged over 7% in Monday's intraday deals after the lender reported strong growth in the December quarter earnings along with improvement in asset quality.

Bank of Maharashtra's standalone profit more than doubled in the December quarter, rising nearly 139% to Rs 775 crore. The lender clocked a profit of Rs 325 crore in the same quarter last year.

On a sequential basis, the profit was up 45%. The net interest income (NII) -- the difference between interest earned and interest expended -- rose 30% year-on-year (YoY) to Rs 1,980 crore, compared with Rs 1,527 crore a year ago. The net interest margin (NIM) during the quarter improved to 3.6%.

Other income for the third quarter stood at Rs 640 crore. The net revenues, which is net interest income plus other income, surged 22% to Rs 2,620 crore during the quarter under review.

The stock was last trading at Rs 33.75 on NSE, up 6.47% over the previous close.

The Pune-based bank's asset quality improved substantially as the gross non-performing assets declined to 2.94% as of December 2022 as against 4.73% as on December 2021. Meanwhile, net NPAs were down to 0.47% during the period under review. The bank made provisions to the tune of Rs 582 crore for the third quarter.

"Provision Coverage ratio improved to 97.18% as on December 2022 as against 93.77% as on December 2021," the bank said in a regulatory filing. The capital adequacy ratio rose to 17% with common equity tier-1 ratio of 13.47% in the December quarter as against 14.85 per cent in the same quarter last year.

Bank of Maharashtra's operating profit rose by 36% to Rs 1,580 crore for the third quarter as against Rs 1,162 crore in the corresponding period of last year.

On the business side, the bank's total deposits clocked a growth of 12% YoY to Rs 2.08 trillion, while gross advances grew by 22%. The lender's retail advances rose 23% to Rs 40,312 crore on a year-on-year basis.

For the nine months ended December, the net profit rose 121 per cent to Rs 1,762 on year-on-year basis as against Rs 796 crore for the same period last year. The net interest income during the nine months period came in at Rs 5,554 crore.