Cash earnings at NAB's wholesale bank increased by A$97 million, or 19 per cent, to $615 million over the March 2013 half year. An emphasis on franchised businesses and better income from infrastructure finance supported the rise, NAB said.The bank reported loan growth of 10 per cent in wholesale over the six months, to $17 billion.On the other hand, the bank is scraping around for new business.Joseph Healy, group executive for business banking, told yesterday's analysts briefing: "There's not a lot of lending activity in the institutional market, and at the quality end of the market people are looking more to the debt capital market. "So I think the reality is that pressure [on margins in] the institutional market will be a feature going forward in the near term." Mark Joiner, the bank's finance director, said that the fall in bad debts had "been the big driver of the improved result over this half, particularly in the corporate and institutional book, where the elevated level of top-ups to impaireds seen in the second half of 2012 has slowed significantly. "We're also seeing substantially fewer new impaireds. "Queensland commercial property has been an important factor here, as that market appears to be finding a floor."Wholesale lifted deposits by a whopping 16 per cent over the six months to $19 billion, thanks to (unspecified) "new distribution channels."