ICICI Bank's Q4 net profit up 39 percent, recommends 110 percent dividend payout

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According to Chanda Kochhar, joint managing director, ICICI Bank, the bank maintained its market leadership in retail credit and also bolstered its presence in corporate banking.

"We have seen strong deposit growth and strong demand in retail fee deposits, which was our aim," Kochhar said.

"We see no change in the investment pipeline by Indian companies," she added, suggesting that fund raising capacities for Indian companies would continue to be strong.

In the corporate and investment banking segment, ICICI Bank cornered 75 percent of all outbound merger and acquisition deals worth about $46 billion in the year.

However, high interest rates affected retail credit, which grew only 3 percent during the year against 30 percent in the previous fiscal.

"In the later half of the year, we tightened standards," said Kochhar. "We realized that given the environment for collection, there are a lot of challenges."

The bank, whose entire credit derivatives portfolio is about $1.6 billion, has offset $100 million as notional losses against treasury income in the March quarter due to the market turmoil, in the wake of the subprime crisis. For the whole year the the bank has offset about $170 million.

However, Kochhar has dismissed fears of ICICI Bank being hit by the global credit squeeze.

"We do not have any exposure to the US subprime market," Kochhar, who is also the chief financial officer, said, noting that the bank has seen tighter credit lending conditions in recent months.

On derivative exposure of corporate clients, Kochhar said the bank does no disclose any profits or losses incurred by its clients.

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