SBI's Government stake reduction-Parliament approved the bill

Indian government is planning to reduce its stake holding from 59 % to 51% in State Bank of India. Bill has been approved in the parliament for the same on Thursday. This will help them to raise capital.” This bill (SBI Amendment 2010) also seeks to enable the SBI to issue bonus shares," Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said while replying to a discussion on the bill. This would also lead the bank to raise funds through preference shares, rights issue, preferential allotment or private placement of shares. Performance of the bank has so far been reasonably good, and there was no plan to bring down the government stake in the bank further. The government will not weaken its majority stake in the bank, he added.

India’s largest bank State Bank of India, which has 4,496 branches across the country and about 0.2 million employees in total, reported a 25% rise in quarterly profit on Thursday, beating forecasts.

SBI's stock closed up 6.9 % at Rs 2,784 after the 2011 Q1 results, in Bombay Stock Exchange