HDFC Bank on Saturday surpassed Street estimates when it reported an 18.5 per cent growth in net profits for the third quarter ended December 31 on better core income and lower provisions.

The country’s largest private sector lender clocked a net profit of Rs 12,259.5 crore compared with Rs 10,342.20 crore in the same period a year ago. Analysts had projected its net profits to be around Rs 12,000 crore.

The better performance on all parameters was led by the net interest income (NII), which grew 24.6 per cent to Rs 22,987.8 crore from Rs 18,443.5 crore in the year-ago period.

Banks have been reporting higher core income as lending rates have climbed more than the deposit rate following the monetary tightening by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) since May.

HDFC Bank also reported lower provisions for the quarter at Rs 2,806.4 crore against Rs 2,994.0 crore for the yearago period.

Moreover, its asset quality was also stable with the ratio of gross non-performing assets (NPAs) to gross advances standing pat at 1.23 per cent from the previous quarter while the same trend was also seen in its net advances, which stood at 0.33 per cent. In absolute terms, bad loans stood at Rs 18,763.90 crore compared with Rs 18,301 crore in the preceding three months.

HDFC Bank added that its total advances as of December 31 stood at Rs 1,506,809 crore, an increase of 19.5 per cent over the year-ago period. Domestic retail loans grew 21.4 per cent, commercial and rural banking loans grew 30.2 per cent, while corporate and other wholesale loans rose 20.3 per cent.

Total deposits stood at Rs 1,733,204 crore as of December 31, 2022, an increase of 19.9 per cent over December 31, 2021. Of this, the low-cost CASA (current account and saving account) deposits grew by 12 per cent with savings account deposits at Rs 5,35,206 crore and current account deposits at Rs 227,745 crore.

Time deposits stood at Rs 9,70,253 crore, an increase of 26.9 per cent over the corresponding quarter of the previous year. CASA deposits comprised 44 per cent of the total deposits as of December 31.

HDFC Bank’s total capital adequacy ratio (CAR) according to Basel III guidelines was at 19.4 per cent (19.5 per cent) against a regulatory requirement of 11.7 per cent, which includes a capital conservation buffer of 2.5 per cent, and an additional requirement of 0.2 per cent as the lender is identified as a domestic systemically important bank.

Of the total CAR, the Tier 1 CAR stood at 17.2 per cent compared with 18.4 per cent a year ago.

Other income rose to Rs 8,499.84 crore from Rs 8,183.55 crore in the year-ago period. Non-banking finance arm HDB Financial Services posted net revenues of Rs 2,233.4 crore against Rs 1,981.6 crore a year ago, a growth of 12.7 per cent.