PAC forms committee to look into balance sheets

Following the report in The Himalayan Times, Publica Accounts Committee (PAC) of parliament has formed a four member team -- including the secretary of PAC Som Bahadur Thapa and auditor of Auditor General's Office -- to look into the matter.
The Himalayan Times has on Wednesday published a report based on variation analysis of audited and unaudited reports of commercial banks.
According to the fiscal year 2006-07 fourth quarters report on variation analysis on net profit in the unaudited report of 19 commercial banks prepared by the Securities Research Centre and Services (SRCS) the reputed banks like Nabil Bank, Nepal Investment Bank Ltd (NIBL), Standard Chartered Bank Nepal (SCNBL), Everest Bank, Lumbini Bank, Laxmi Bank and NMB Bank have less than one per cent variation, which is negligible.
However, the highest variation is 100.47 per cent and the lowest is 0.02 per cent, while going through the unaudited and audited books of the 19 commercial banks. Last year the highest variation between the unaudited and audited report was 31.52 per cent. Among the listed commercial banks, the highest in the fiscal year 2007-08 is 33.49 per cent and among the not-listed ones the variation is 100.47 per cent.
The report shows that the central bank has to increase its monitoring ansd supervision as the number of financial institutions is increasing.
Those who has clean balance sheet are Nepal Investment Bank that has a variation of 0.24 per cent and Nabil Bank that has 0.51 per cent variation. Similarly, SCNBL has 0.56 per cent and Everest Bank has a 0.24 per cent variation followed by Laxmi Bank with 0.60 per cent variation that are negligible.
Himalayan Bank and Bank of Kathmandu both has 2.83 per cent and 2.63 per cent variation, while NIC Bank also has a variation of 2.36 per cent in its audited and unaudited reports.
NCC Bank's loss had increased to Rs 11.24 million or 10.74 per cent inthe fiscal year's repord but this year it has a variation of only 0.64 per cen. However, Lumbini Bank in the 2006-07 report had the highest variation -- 31.52 per cent or Rs 71.18 million difference between its unaudited and audited report. But in 2007-08, the bank has a minimal difference of 0.32 only.