Tables were used earlier for developing layouts when CSS3 wasn't around but that's not the case anymore. The the only logical reason to use HTML tables now is when you're actually presenting tabular data.
Otherwise, you should absolutely avoid using HTML <table> for layouts.
This said, there are cases where html tables can still be quite useful.
One example could be HTML Emails. HTML <table> is a necessity in html emails because of the lack of CSS support the clients offer.
So the thumb rule would be to use tables in systems with little to no CSS support or where the CSS has to be avoided but you still need a layout(like banking/payment applications).