Mumbai, May 2 (Reuters) - India's Kotak Mahindra Bank KTKM.NS reported a jump in fourth-quarter profit that beat estimates on Saturday, supported by strong loan growth and lower provisions for potential bad loans.
The country's third-largest private lender's standalone net profit rose 13% to 40.27 billion rupees for the quarter ended March 31 from last year. Analysts had expected a profit of 37.37 billion rupees, according to data compiled by LSEG.
Loan demand in India gained momentum in the second half of the fiscal year ended in March as easing inflation and lower taxes supported household spending and corporate borrowing.
The lender's net advances expanded 16% in the quarter from a year earlier, mainly driven by retail and corporate loans. Total deposits rose by 15%.
Last month, larger peers HDFC Bank HDBK.NS and ICICI Bank ICBK.NS beat profit views aided by strong loan growth.
Net interest income – the difference between interest earned on loans and interest paid on deposits - rose 8% to 78.76 billion rupees.
Provisions and contingencies fell 36% quarter-on-quarter and 43% year-on-year to 5.16 billion rupees.
The lender's gross non-performing asset ratio fell to 1.2% at the end of March, from 1.42% in the year-ago quarter.
(Reporting by Ashwin Manikandan, Jayshree P Upadhyay in Mumbai and Nishit Navin in Bangalore; Editing by Harikrishnan Nair and Peter Graff)
((Nishit.Navin@thomsonreuters.com;))