SBI Cards and Payment Services

“And we stick to the guidance that we had given that the spends getting translated into receivables will happen in the second half and will start from Q3 itself.”

“Festivities have just started, and we are expecting the spend growth to be somewhere from the mid-teens to the high teens for the entire year.”

“And we will continue with the guidance that for us, we will work on keeping the NIM stable.”

“On the instance base fees, last time we said that it should grow in line with our cards growth.”

“So Kunal, for your first question, I think, last quarter or the quarter before that, we had given this guidance that because of the festive season as well as the the uptick in the acquisitions, which has happened, the receivable growth will be witnessed in the second half of the current financial year.”

“As we had said earlier also, in principle, we would keep corporate spends as less than 20% of our overall spend.”

“UPI spends on credit cards continued to grow 17% quarter-over-quarter”

“This quarter itself, INR21,300 crores of spends have occurred through UPI.”

“With festive sales and Diwali starting in October and November this year, we expect the spends to pick up further.”

“So one reason is that some of the things like mobile phones have become more expensive. There, we are finding more takers for EMIs as well. All those things are resulting in higher offtake of EMIs. That is the biggest lever.”

“And Mahesh, spend per customer, per account, per card, all of it is going up.”

“Operating cost during the quarter was INR2,649 crores, with 7% increase Y-o-Y. The cost-to- income ratio for the quarter was 58.7%, up 193 basis points year-over-year.”

“Portfolio yield for the quarter was 16.1%. The daily weighted average cost of funds for Q2 was 6.8%. The cost is up by 18 basis points quarter-over-quarter.”

“We will continue to optimize our borrowing mix to minimize the impact of increase in cost of funds and continue building a bigger EMI-based portfolio to keep the NIM stable.”

“And as we have been indicating that if we can convert more transactors, where we have a negative carry, to EMIs, that will improve the yields overall and will keep the NIM stable.”

“So the ability to pass on our increased cost of funds on the newer book that we are generating, that also should help us on the portfolio yield.”

“Our capital adequacy ratio was at a comfortable level of more than 26%. ROA for the quarter was 4.4%, 180 bps higher Y-o-Y, while ROE was at 18.4%, 631 basis points higher Y-o-Y.”

“At this point in time, it is a working capital loan, which is cheaper by almost about 50 to 60 basis points, actually more 70 to 80 basis points.”

“Right now, since the CP rates are not so good, we have not been doing it.”

“Basically, most of the assets are short term. So there, we have a lot of, I would say, headroom to look at short-term lending’s. But having said that, we are also mindful that the rates are going to increase.”

“During this quarter, we augmented our co-branded credit card portfolio with the launch of Google Pay Flex SBI Card.”

“We also launched the Advantage SBI Card on SBI YONO to offer a seamless digital journey that enables SBI customers to avail a secured credit card backed by a fixed deposit.”

“We have co-brand with PhonePe, we have co-brand with Google Pay and Flipkart. So these are the 4 prominent ones. And the latest in that line is Eternal.”

“So on the new customer acquisition, on the first wave of 4 years, 5 years back, when Amazon and Flipkart went with co-brand partners, we did not participate for profitability reasons, This time now, when some of them have come for renewal and others, we have looked at them again.”

“Accordingly, an additional provision of INR30 crores has been made to prudently provide for the heightened macroeconomic uncertainty.”

“With this, the company now carries an additional provision of INR100 crores as of quarter ended September 30, 2026.”

“First of all, this is not a provision. This is a write-back that we have done. We have retained INR30 crores as a management overlay, Anuj.”

“Company was carrying an additional provision of INR70 crores up to the previous quarter.”

“The prolonged conflict in West Asia and the resulting higher energy prices, inflation and interest rates may impact household cash flows.”

“And we have a very diversified portfolio, and we are not seeing anything which concerns us as of now.”

“And yes, we do believe that now this credit cost has more or less reached a level where there's not much of a scope to reduce it further.”

“But if you total the Stage 2 and Stage 3, it is the same spread. So it is like you can say the quarterly seasonality.”

“Coming to your first point, as of now, we have not relaxed the risk filters.”

“Cards in Force have grown to around 2 Crore32 lakhs with 8% growth Y-o-Y.”

“SBI Card continues to be India's second largest credit card issuer with Cards in Force market share at 18.5%.”

“Our new account sourcing distribution remains balanced with about 49% sourcing from Banca and 51% from open market this quarter.”

“Totals spend during the quarter reached INR1,10,689 crores with a growth of around 3% year-over-year.”

“Retail spends reached the highest ever level of INR95,299 crores with a 6% growth Y-o-Y.”