Indian Banks-Asset Quality
Hiccup or a crisis?
The clouds of economic gloom and the ensuing liquidity crunch have dealt a
double blow to corporate bottomlines. Worries are growing on asset quality of
banks as borrowers are on a shaky ground, and lenders (banks) cannot be but
vulnerable to the risk of rising defaults. But a remarkably long stint of economic
prosperity has led to tenable balance sheets (60% lower leverage than in the NPA
cycle of late-1990s) and much higher personal income levels while banks have
lower exposure to troubled sectors. After applying our credit screens to the
sample set of corporates and assessment of personal incomes, we conclude that
14% of bank credit is vulnerable. Of this, a proportion is likely to manifest as NPAs
(or get restructured) and the impact would be spread over the next 2-3 years. While
we expect NPAs to peak at 5.7% in FY11 (7.7% in the worst case), our estimates
build in a 60-70% rise in FY10 credit costs.
Rise in NPAs imminent...: A cyclical turn in the economy, accentuated by the global
credit freeze and subsequent domestic liquidity squeeze, has dented the confidence of
an effervescent India Inc. The demand slump and steep fall in commodity prices pose a
threat to corporate bottomlines. As a result, a host of smaller and leveraged companies
are facing acute liquidity shortage – threatening to translate into a solvency crisis.
Uncertainty on personal incomes also builds a case for rise in retail NPAs.
…dimensioning the threat: Our analysis suggests that NPAs will be well below that in
the previous cycle due to lower leverage of corporates (0.36x vs peak of 0.88x in FY97),
banks’ limited exposure to vulnerable sectors as also better restructuring and recovery
practices. Our view rests on analysis of components of bank credit, detailed evaluation
of balance sheets of ~3,000 companies and assessment of personal income levels. After
applying our credit screens, we see 14% of bank credit under stress, of which a
proportion is likely to manifest as NPAs or get restructured. As the impact is likely to
be spread over the next 2-3 years, we expect gross NPAs to peak in FY11 at 5.7%.
Rank order in the risk spectrum: We have assessed expected asset quality performance
of large banks relative to peers. We have superimposed our understanding of
industrywise stress on their portfolios, compared the exposure to vulnerable segments,
credit growth and their balance sheet strength. We find that HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank
and Bank of Baroda are better placed to endure the rise in NPAs while SBI and Bank of
India appear to be more vulnerable to the stress.
CONTENTS
Asset Quality: Hiccup or a crisis? .......................................................................3
Concerns Loom Large: NPAs to rise ..................................................................9
Assessing the Damage ......................................................................................13
How is this cycle different from NPA crisis of Late 1990s?.................................17
Corporate Debt: Litmus test ............................................................................20
Stress Synopsis ...................................................................................................26
Retail Assets: A mixed bag................................................................................33
How Banks Stack Up .......................................................................................36
Annexure..........................................................................................................47
Key aggregate financials of our sample set ..........................................................47
Aggregate financials of large companies – (sales >Rs10bn)..................................48
Aggregate financials of Medium companies – (sales Rs2-10bn) ..........................49
Aggregate financials of small companies – (sales <Rs2bn) ...................................50
Aggregate financials of stressed sectors................................................................51
Modalities of restructuring of loans ....................................................................55