The bank will issue 10 crore equity shares of Rs 10 each for cash at par. Out of this, 10 per cent will be reserved for the employees of the bank. According to Vijaya Banks's chairman and managing director S Gopalakrishnan "the equity of the bank will be listed on the National Stock Exchange, Bombay Stock Exchange and Bangalore Stock Exchange. The issue is being lead-managed by SBI Capital Markets, DSP Merrill Lynch, Kotak Mahindra Capital Company and JM Morgan Stanley. Mr Gopalakrishnan said that the main objective of the issue is to augment the capital base of the bank to meet its future capital adequacy requirement and to shore up the capital funds needed for healthy assets expansion, and profitability. "The bank's board has decided to issue the shares at par to reward the investors in the future", Mr Gopalakrishnan said.

In the post financial sector reforms from 1992-2000, the bank's deposits rose by an average rate of about 20 per cent and stood at Rs 11,592.88 crore at end-March-2000. Advances have been growing by over 20 per cent during the last three years reaching a level of Rs 4,687.61 crore at end-March 2000.

Vijaya Bank has a well diversified loan portfolio spread over many industries with exposure not exceeding five per cent to any single industry as on March 31, 2000. The bank's investments in approved securities are 100 per cent marked-to-market as against the minimum level of 75 per cent prescribed by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). The bank's capital adequacy stood at 10.61 per cent as on March 31, 2000 as against the minimum requirement of nine per cent specified by the RBI.

Vijaya Bank's gross profit went up to Rs 125.44 crore in fiscal 2000 from Rs 4.90 crore in fiscal 1996. The net profit showed a 75 per cent growth in 2000. The banks's net interest income has shown a growth of 112 per cent in the last five financial years. The banks gross NPA came down significantly to 11.51 per cent from 20.37 per cent in fiscal 1996), while net-NPAs have dropped to 6.65 per cent (11.61 per cent). The bank has low cost of deposits of 7.8 per cent.

Mr Gopalakrishnan noted that "for the current year ending March 2001, the bank wants to reduce the net-NPA level to five per cent from 6.65 per cent and wants introduce e-commerce and internet banking".