Latest news with #NBFCs
Time of India
a day ago
- Business
- Time of India
Time to take a logical risk: 6 housing finance stocks with upside potential of up to 43%
Synopsis It's a sector that has had its good guys as well as its villains. Just about seven years back, it was a housing finance company that was responsible for a major scandal that rocked NBFCs. At the same time, the sector has seen one of the biggest wealth creators in the history of the Indian stock markets. Under the strict regulatory gaze of the RBI, the companies in the sector have been underperformers for a while. However, they are now slowly stirring to life. So, watch them closely.
Time of India
2 days ago
- Business
- Time of India
Bank loans to NBFCs slows sharply
MUMBAI: Bank lending to non-banking finance companies slowed sharply in April, with outstanding loans to the sector falling by Rs 25,512 crore to Rs 16.1 lakh crore. At the end of March 2025, bank credit to NBFCs stood at Rs 16.4 lakh crore, marking a modest growth of 5.7% in FY25. This was significantly lower than the overall bank credit growth of 11% during the year, to Rs 182 lakh crore, indicating a cooling in lending appetite toward shadow banks. The slowdown in credit to NBFCs was part of a broader trend. Lending to large industries also moderated in April. The share of loans to large corporates declined to 15% of total bank credit, down from 16% at the end of March 2024. In comparison, housing loans now account for a larger share at 16.6%, underlining the shift in bank lending preferences toward the retail segment. Overall, the industry's share in total bank credit fell to 21.4% from 22% a year ago. Bank loans to individuals against gold jewellery continued to grow adding Rs 3,427 crore during April 2025 taking the total outstanding to Rs 2.2 lakh crore. In FY24, bank loans against jewellery had risen 103% to Rs 2.08 lakh crore a large part of which was due to reclassification of gold-backed agri loans. Data from 41 major scheduled commercial banks, which account for about 95% of all non-food credit, showed that year-on-year bank credit growth stood at 12% in the fortnight ended March 21, 2025. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like American Investor Warren Buffett Recommends: 5 Books For Turning Your Life Around Blinkist: Warren Buffett's Reading List Undo This was lower than the 16.3% growth recorded in the same period last year, reflecting a broad deceleration in credit expansion. Credit to agriculture and allied activities grew by 10.4% in March 2025, compared to 20% in the corresponding period last year. Lending to industry rose by 8%, the same as the previous year. While sectors such as petroleum, metal products, engineering, and construction saw higher credit offtake, lending to infrastructure slowed. The services sector also saw a deceleration, with credit rising by 13.4%, down from 20.8% a year earlier. This was mainly due to a sharp slowdown in bank loans to NBFCs, although credit to professional services and trade remained robust. In the personal loan segment, growth eased to 14% from 17.6% in the previous year. The deceleration was mainly due to lower growth in vehicle loans, credit card outstandings and other personal loans, indicating a cooling in consumer demand for credit. Stay informed with the latest business news, updates on bank holidays and public holidays . AI Masterclass for Students. Upskill Young Ones Today!– Join Now
Mint
2 days ago
- Business
- Mint
Fintechs in talks with RBI for easier provisioning for default loss guarantee-backed loans
Mumbai: Fintech companies and digital lenders are seeking easier provisioning norms for loan pools backed by their guarantees, even as the central bank has flagged inadequate provisioning for these loans, according to five industry experts. Fintechs believe the provisioning variance is due to the differentiated interpretation of Ind-AS accounting standards, which allow for a 'risk mitigant' like Default Loss Guarantee to be considered while calculating the expected credit loss (ECL) provisions. Unified Fintech Forum and self-regulatory organisation Fintech Association for Consumer Empowerment (FACE), in their representiations to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), have said that making full provisions against such loans will lead to 'double provisioning', with both the lending service providers (LSPs) like fintechs and regulated entities such as banks and non-bank lenders setting aside buffers for the same loan pool. Read more: RBI poised to cut rates as India eyes a steady takeoff Both the LSP and the regulated entities are provisioning for the same loan pool, thus impacting capital deployment efficiency, said Jatin Handoo, chief executive officer of UFF, formerly Digital Lenders' Association of India. It might also lead to a 'crowding out' effect where lenders will have less amount of money for lending because they have to take out the extra amount and provide for it separately, he said. 'RBI is open to listening to us and has asked us to come up with data-based use cases, and customer-level and market insights." Full provisioning by NBFCs Fintechs offer borrowers loans from multiple banks. These intermediaries usually provide a 'default loss guarantee' (DLG) to cover these loans for encouraging lenders to partner with them. However, in April, the central bank wrote to at least four non-bank lenders with high delinquencies in their DLG-backed loans. The regulator asked them to provide for all loan pools sourced through third-party digital platforms under the expected credit loss (ECL) accounting norms, regardless of whether these are backed by DLG arrangements. A senior industry official explained that if the loss on the loan pool was 7% and 5% was covered under a DLG arrangement, some NBFCs usually had a provision cover of 2-4%, depending on their internal modelling and calculations. Audits by RBI in January-February revealed this provision accounting, following which RBI reinforced that the entire provisioning has to be taken by the NBFC and any recoveries under DLG at the end of the loan tenure may be used to write-back the provisions. 'This is not a policy change, but a call-out for those NBFCs that were not doing enough provisioning. It's a prompt for NBFCs to appropriately provision against credit losses, and treat DLGs and recoveries separately," said Kunal Varma, chief executive officer and founder of digital non-banking finance company Freo. However, he said, this may lead to some NBFCs re-evaluating their First Loss Default Guarantee or FLDG-linked relationships in the short term. RBI's concerns stem from elevated delinquencies in some loan pools sourced by fintechs, leading to higher DLG payouts by them and a hit on the asset quality of a few partner NBFCs. Moreover, there have also been concerns around NBFCs using FLDG arrangements as an alternative to securitisation transactions, bypassing the guidelines of securitisation of loan pools. RBI's perspective seems to be that DLG arrangements were allowed to give capital comfort from a regulatory perspective and encourage 'skin in the game' for fintechs, but not dilute the accountability of underwriting by regulated entities. Point of contention Typically, each fintech—such as Paytm, PhonePe, MobiKwik—ties up with multiple regulated banks or NBFCs to offer multiple loan options to their customers. In turn, lenders can accept DLG arrangements in the form of cash deposits, fixed deposits with a lien marked in their favour, and bank guarantees. DLG arrangements for pools of small-ticket unsecured loans are generally used for consumption and lifestyle lending, emergency healthcare expenses, education finance for skill development or vocational degrees and diplomas, sustainable energy such as installing a solar roof and lending to small businesses and new-to-credit borrowers. Read more: How RBI is shaping the future of lending from Bengaluru's HSR Layout FLDG has been a point of contention since the first digital lending guidelines were issued in August 2022. Worried that these DLG loss absorptions were leading to inaccurate reflection of the credit quality of these borrowers, RBI in June 2023 issued the default loss guarantee framework, capping the value of such arrangements at 5% of the loan pool. It had then specified that regulated entities will be responsible for recognising non-performing assets of individual loans in the portfolio and the consequent provisioning as per current norms, regardless of any DLG cover at the portfolio level. Even then industry representatives had approached RBI seeking clarity on certain aspects of the guidelines such as treatment of NPAs given the differences with the ECL framework, and on the kind of different cohorts and structures that can be explored under the DLG framework. This had prompted RBI to issue an FAQ in November 2023 clarifying some of these aspects. However, these circulars were repealed when the consolidated Digital Lending Guidelines were issued on 8 May 2025, leading to some confusion on how provisioning for these loans may be interpreted. Fintech lenders believe that DLG is a form of credit guarantee or enhancement—the entire purpose of which is to provide capital comfort to the lender and help free up the lender's capital for additional on-lending. 'As per Ind-AS, NBFCs were considering the credit enhancement provided by an FLDG for purposes of computing the ECL on a loan portfolio (given that an FLDG qualifies as a credit enhancement intrinsic to the contractual terms of the arrangement, which is the requirement under Ind-AS 109)," said Shilpa Mankar Ahluwalia, partner, head-fintech, Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co. RBI's 8 May directions, however, suggest that the amount of the DLG cover cannot be adjusted to reduce ECL computation, which could alter the cost-benefit to NBFCs given the zero-provisioning benefit of DLGs, according to experts who believe it could also send 'mixed signals" to market participants, investors and new entrants in the LSP space and may lead to the opinion that fintechs are not to be trusted. Read more: Lenders concerned about education loans as US tightens curbs on student visas Already, DLG rules only allow lien-marked deposits or bank guarantees, which practically removes any performance risk on such guarantees, said Ahluwalia. 'The industry also claims that capping the DLG at 5% had already prompted NBFCs to implement strong credit underwriting and risk tools, and removing the provisioning benefit of DLG cover may increase costs of digital loans and reduce credit access."
Time of India
2 days ago
- Business
- Time of India
RBI imposes ₹54.78 crore in penalties on 353 banks, other regulated entities during FY25
The Reserve Bank of India ( RBI ) imposed penalties totalling ₹54.78 crore on 353 regulated entities (REs) during the financial year 2024–25 for various contraventions of statutory provisions and regulatory directions, the central bank said in its annual report released on Thursday. The enforcement actions were taken against banks, non-banking financial companies (NBFCs), asset reconstruction companies (ARCs), housing finance companies, and cooperative banks for non-compliance in areas including cyber security, exposure norms, income recognition and asset classification (IRAC), Know Your Customer (KYC) guidelines, fraud classification and reporting, submission of data to the Central Repository of Information on Large Credits (CRILC), and credit information reporting to credit information companies (CICs). Also Read: RBI may introduce bank-like rate norms for NBFCs to plug policy gaps Play Video Pause Skip Backward Skip Forward Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration 0:00 Loaded : 0% 0:00 Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 1x Playback Rate Chapters Chapters Descriptions descriptions off , selected Captions captions settings , opens captions settings dialog captions off , selected Audio Track default , selected Picture-in-Picture Fullscreen This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Opacity Opaque Semi-Transparent Text Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Opacity Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Caption Area Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Opacity Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Drop shadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Camarotes de crucero sin vender (Eche un vistazo a los precios) GoSearches | Search Ads Undo 'During 2024-25, the Department undertook enforcement action against REs and imposed 353 penalties aggregating to ₹54.78 crore for contraventions/non-compliance with provisions of statutes and certain directions issued by the Reserve Bank from time to time,' the RBI said in its Annual Report for 2024–25. According to the data, cooperative banks were the most penalised category, with 264 penalties amounting to ₹15.63 crore. The central bank also took action against 37 NBFCs and ARCs, imposing penalties totalling ₹7.29 crore. Live Events Additionally, 13 housing finance companies were fined a combined ₹83 lakh. Among commercial banks, eight public sector banks faced penalties totaling ₹11.11 crore, while 15 private sector banks were fined ₹14.8 crore. The RBI also penalised six foreign banks during the fiscal year . With inputs from PTI
Time of India
2 days ago
- Business
- Time of India
RBI slaps Rs 54.78 crore in penalties on banks and NBFCs for compliance lapses in FY25
Reserve Bank of India's (RBI) NEW DELHI: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) imposed penalties totalling Rs 54.78 crore on regulated entities (REs) during the fiscal year ending March 31, 2025, for contraventions and non-compliance with statutory provisions and regulatory directions. According to the RBI's Annual Report for 2024-25, released on Thursday, the central bank undertook enforcement action in 353 cases across a wide range of regulatory breaches. These included failures in the cyber security framework, non-adherence to exposure norms, income recognition and asset classification (IRAC) rules, violations of Know Your Customer (KYC) guidelines, and delays in fraud classification and reporting. The report further revealed that cooperative banks bore the brunt of the action, with 264 penalties amounting to Rs 15.63 crore. Non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) and asset reconstruction companies faced 37 penalties totalling Rs 7.29 crore, while 13 housing finance companies were fined Rs 83 lakh. Among banks, the RBI penalised eight public sector banks to the tune of Rs 11.11 crore and 15 private banks faced penalties amounting to Rs 14.8 crore. Additionally, six foreign banks were also penalised for various lapses. The RBI noted that these enforcement actions were aimed at ensuring compliance and fostering a robust and sound financial system. Stay informed with the latest business news, updates on bank holidays and public holidays . AI Masterclass for Students. Upskill Young Ones Today!– Join Now
