UCO Bank slips after government orders forensic audit

NEW DELHI: UCO Bank slipped as much as 8.3 per cent in trade on Wednesday, after the government ordered limited forensic audit into some non-performing accounts of Kolkata-based UCO Bank to find out any irregularities in sanction of loans.

At 09:20 a.m.; UCO Bank was trading 6.3 per cent lower at Rs 92.15. It hit a low of Rs 90.15 and a high of Rs 92.90 in trade today.

This is the fourth public sector bank where forensic audit is being conducted after alleged cash-for-loan scam came to light with the arrest of Syndicate Bank Chairman and Managing Director S K Jain earlier this month, PTI reported.

Jain was arrested for allegedly receiving a bribe of Rs 50 lakh to enhance credit limits of Bhushan Steel and Prakash Industries.

As per the report, forensic audit is being conducted against Dena Bank and Oriental Bank of Commerce (OBC) where some officials were suspected of misappropriating funds worth Rs 436 crore from their fixed deposit customers.

The gross non-performing assets (NPAs) of the state-run UCO bank stood at Rs 6,346.32 crore at the end of June. In percentage terms it was 4.31 per cent of the total advances. At the same time, net NPA of the bank stood at Rs 3,344.02 crore.