PNB shares rally for 8th straight day, climb 7% today. Here's why

Shares of Punjab National Bank (PNB) climbed 7 per cent in Friday's trade to take their winning run to the eighth straight session.  The stock rose 7.38 per cent to hit a high of Rs 54.55 on BSE, taking its 8-day rise to 24 per cent. Friday's rise on the counter was seen after DIPAM approved the divestment of the bank's stake in UTI Asset Management Company in single or multiple tranches.

PNB owned 15.22 per cent stake in UTI Asset Management Company as of September 30. That stake is valued at Rs 1,394.52 crore today , following a 7.36 per cent rise in the AMC stock. The AMC stock hit a high Rs 740.15 on BSE today.

In a filing to BSE, PNB said the timeline, the value of divestment and the price at which the shares will be divested would aer yet to be decided.  UTI AMC has been promoted by four sponsors, namely, State Bank of India, Life Insurance Corporation of India, Bank of Baroda and Punjab National Bank and presently, they collectively hold 45.16 per cent of the shares of UTI AMC.

Meanwhile, CARE Ratings has revised the outlook for the bank's AT-1, Tier II bonds and Infrastructure bonds from 'Stable' to 'Positive'. The scrip was also not under F&O ban list on Friday.

"The ‘Positive’ outlook reflects CARE Ratings’ expectation of improvement in profitability and asset quality parameters in the medium term along with comfortable capitalisation by the bank. In the last two years ended March 31, 2022, and H1FY23, the bank witnessed a significant reduction in both, GNPA and NNPA. CARE Ratings expects the same to continue going forward," the rating agency said.

Improvement in the asset quality parameters with gross non-performing assets (GNPA) reducing below 8.5 per cent or net non-performing assets (NNPA) below 3 per cent on a sustained basis is seen as a key positive.

PNB has seen improvement in the capitalisation levels with a significant cushion over the regulatory requirement, CARE said.

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