Investment Reserve Account (IRA)

In the event, provisions created on account of depreciation in the ‘AFS’ or ‘HFT’ categories are found to be in excess of the required amount in any year, the excess should be credited to the Profit & Loss account and an equivalent amount (net of taxes, if any and net of transfer to Statutory Reserves as applicable to such excess provision) should be appropriated to an IRA Account in Schedule 2 – “Reserves & Surplus” under the head “Revenue and other Reserves”, and would be eligible for inclusion under Tier-II within the overall ceiling of 1.25 per cent of total Risk Weighted Assets prescribed for General Provisions/ Loss Reserves.
Banks may utilise IRA as follows:
The provisions required to be created on account of depreciation in the AFS and HFT categories should be debited to the P&L Account and an equivalent amount (net of tax benefit, if any, and net of consequent reduction in the transfer to Statutory Reserve), may be transferred from the IRA to the P&L Account.
Illustratively, banks may draw down from the IRA to the extent of provision made during the year towards depreciation in investment in AFS and HFT categories (net of taxes, if any, and net of transfer to Statutory Reserves as applicable to such excess provision). In other words, a bank which pays a tax of 30% and should appropriate 25% of the net profits to Statutory Reserves, can draw down Rs.52.50 from the IRA, if the provision made for depreciation in investments included in the AFS and HFT categories is Rs.100.
(vii) The amounts debited to the P&L Account for provision should be debited under the head ‘Expenditure - Provisions & Contingencies’. The amount transferred from the IRA to the P&L Account, should be shown as ‘below the line’ item in the Profit and Loss Appropriation Account, after determining the profit for the year. Provision towards any erosion in the value of an asset is an item of charge on the profit and loss account, and hence should appear in that account before arriving at the profit for the accounting period. Adoption of the following would not only be adoption of a wrong accounting principle but would, also result in a wrong statement of the profit for the accounting period:a)the provision is allowed to be adjusted directly against an item of Reserve without being shown in the profit and loss account, OR
(b) a bank is allowed to draw down from the IRA before arriving at the profit for the accounting period (i.e., above the line), OR
(c) a bank is allowed to make provisions for depreciation on investment as a below the line item, after arriving at the profit for the period, Hence none of the above options are permissible.(viii) In terms of our guidelines on payment of dividend by banks, dividends should be payable only out of current year's profit. The amount drawn down from the IRA will, therefore, not be available to a bank for payment of dividend among the shareholders. However, the balance in the IRA transferred ‘below the line’ in the Profit and Loss Appropriation Account to Statutory Reserve, General Reserve or balance of Profit & Loss Account would be eligible to be reckoned as Tier I capital.