Even as the government assured that there is no problem with the leading private sector lender ICICI Bank, whose shares tumbled more than 20 per cent on Friday, the bank itself asserted that it had adequate rupee liquidity.
"We do not see any problem with the ICICI Bank," said a senior finance ministry official, adding, all Indian banks are well-capitalised and well-regulated. He added the Capital Adequacy Ratio of each bank is above 10 per cent, well above the regulatory requirement of nine per cent.
Meanwhile, Chanda Kochhar, ICICI Bank joint managing director and CFO, said that ICICI Bank has over Rs 12,000 crore liquidity 'even in international markets and that it does not use 'rupee liquidity' to fund its international operations.'
"We have no sizable international investments and the ones that are present are in the form of international loans to Indian companies to fund their international operations. As far as the British subsidiary is concerned, we havesome investments, but the exposure is very small for a company with a net worth of Rs 47,000 crore (Rs 470 billion)," Kochhar added.
The ICICI Bank CFO said that all the loans that it had extended were secure and that the bank had enough cash against them to help it overcome any problem. She was commenting on rumours that ICICI Bank's exposure is large as it has given easy loans with inadequate collaterals in form of shares.
