The Reserve Bank of India on Friday permitted IDFC to exempt 30 percent of loan book from Statutory Liquidity Ratio (SLR)/ Cash Reserve Ratio (CRR). Most analysts had expected a 50-100 percent exemption.
In April last year, IDFC and Bandhan Financial Services Pvt bagged the licence from the RBI to set up a bank. IDFC board approved its plans to demerge its financial unit into a wholly-owned step-down subsidiary IDFC Bank Ltd last year.
Suruchi Jain of Morningstar is not surprised and says all banks should be subjected to the same rules. Hence, the exemption is 30 percent of the eligible loans for the first year, which is the same for all the banks, the following years it will be taken up to 50 percent and 60 percent of loans.
Below is the verbatim transcript of Suruchi Jain's interview with Ekta Batra and Latha Venkatesh on CNBC-TV18.
Ekta: Your thoughts and were you on the conference call and about the statutory liquidity ratio (SLR), cash reserve ratio (CRR) exemption if you can fill us in?
A: The exemption is 30 percent of the eligible loans for the first year and that’s the same for all the banks and the following years it will be taken up to 50 percent and 60 percent of loans. So it’s no different from any of the other banks.
Latha: So are you reworking your numbers?
A: So, what we had expected was that their rules will be the same as a bank because now they are a bank more than a Non-bank financial company (NBFC).
Latha: So, you’re not disappointed?
A: No, we aren’t.
Ekta: So, you wouldn’t be changing your estimates on account of this, what would your estimates in terms of return on equity (ROEs) be?
A: So, our (ROEs) are rising in terms of it transferring to a bank and that’s mainly because they can take up higher leverage and as a result while return on assets (ROAs) might temper down a bit, the (ROEs) will actually expand mainly because of the leverage factor.
Discover the latest Business News, Sensex, and Nifty updates. Obtain Personal Finance insights, tax queries, and expert opinions on Moneycontrol or download the Moneycontrol App to stay updated!
