Bajaj Finance March quarter profit up by 11 per cent

MUMBAI: Pune based Bajaj Finance has reported 11% year-on-year rise in its net profit at Rs 182 crore driven by rise in the net interest income or the difference between interest earned and paid out, that increased 25% y-o-y.

The lending arm of the Bajaj Finserv group was one of the contenders for the new banking licence but could not obtain it for which it was readying itself.

“In the process of setting up a base for banking business, we have tapped business opportunities in rural lending, commercial loans and wealth management,” said Sanjiv Bajaj, managing director at Bajaj Finserv. “We would like to focus on those through our existing NBFC. However, we still look at entering into banking business through differentiated licence, depending on guidelines.”

The company expanded loan deployments by 34% y-o-y to Rs 26,024 crore. Assets under management stood at Rs 24,061 crore as on March 31, 2014; compared with Rs 17,517 crore a year ago.

On consolidated basis, Bajaj Finserv, the holding company, reported a marginal fall of 2% y-o-y in net profit to Rs 1,544 crore due to poor show by its life insurance arm where net profit dipped more than 20% y-o-y.