India's Nifty Posts First Gain in Six Sessions; Yes Bank Falls

(Bloomberg) -- Indian stocks rose even as Yes Bank Ltd.’s quarterly profit report put investors’ focus back on bad loans.

Grasim Industries Ltd.’s 6 percent jump helped the NSE Nifty 50 Index gain for the first time in six sessions, advancing 0.4 percent to 9,136.40 in Mumbai. Yes Bank was the biggest drag on the gauge, falling 3.8 percent. An index of lenders dropped 0.3 percent to its its lowest level in two weeks.

Billionaire Rana Kapoor’s Yes Bank on Wednesday posted a 63 percent increase in fourth-quarter provisions for bad debts and said bad loans almost doubled from the previous quarter. It attributed those increases to new guidelines from the central bank, which on Tuesday directed banks to set aside more capital as a buffer to loans made to so-called stressed sectors such as telecommunications.

“Results of Yes Bank clearly indicate that we are still not out of the woods,” Abhimanyu Sofat, vice president at Mumbai-based India Infoline Finance Ltd., said by phone. “RBI tightening in terms of provisioning is creating nervousness,” he said referring to the central bank.

Summary

• Sensex +0.3% to 29,422.39, index up for a second consecutive day
• Realty index leads nine of 13 sector gauges higher
• Sasken Technologies +3.3% after 4Q net income more than doubled from previous quarter
• Sun TV Network +6.7%; upgraded by CLSA, Credit Suisse as subscriptions rise
• India airline stocks rally after crude oil decline, strong traffic; Spicejet Ltd. +10.4%, InterGlobe Aviation Ltd. +6.6% and Jet Airways Ltd. +6.5%

--With assistance from Santanu Chakraborty

To contact the reporter on this story: Nupur Acharya in Mumbai at nacharya7@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Divya Balji at dbalji1@bloomberg.net, Vivek Shankar, Todd White