Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to the Kotak Mahindra Bank Q1 FY 2025 earnings conference c all. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in the listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during this conference, please signal an operator by pressing star and then zero on your touch-tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Ashok Vaswani, Managing Director and CEO of Kotak Mahindra Bank. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Thank you. Thank you so much, and welcome everyone on this call to discuss the first quarter 2025 results. The first quarter has been a very busy quarter for us, and today I thought I'd cover three things with you, which I'm sure are on the top of your mind as well. I think the primary and first thing I'd like to cover is the power of being a financial services conglomerate. Obviously, as you know, that in this quarter, we closed the disinvestment of a 70% stake in Kotak General Insurance to Zurich Insurance for a consideration of INR 5,560 crores. The reason I'm highlighting this is because, number one, as I've always mentioned, we will always evaluate our businesses from the eyes of our shareholders.
In instances where we think that there could be a better owner that could generate a higher value, we will evaluate that option. In this case, not only have we got a great return, compounded growth rate of 45% since we started in 2014, but have a continuing relationship with Zurich, both in terms of ownership and operational activity, which will continue to be highly accretive to our shareholders. Two, this transaction also demonstrates the real value of our subsidiaries, both in terms of the current embedded value and the way the value grows year-on-year. Obviously, where we feel that we have got a good position and that where we have the capabilities to run a particular line of business in a subsidiary on our own, we like the notion of being a financial services conglomerate.
And that really is the second point that I wanted to come to, that the power of being together and the power of having the four businesses of B anking and Lending, Asset M anagement, Capital M arkets, and Protection, really allows us to meet the holistic needs of our customers. I'll come to that a little later. The second thing I wanted to talk to you about was obviously the RBI order. I'm very pleased to report that we have made substantial progress on all the points through significant work that our technology teams have put in. In consultation with the RBI, we have put together a comprehensive plan. We have beefed our internal team with resources from Accenture, Infosys, Oracle, and Cisco, and focused on relentless execution.
We appointed GT Bharat as our external auditors with the approval of the RBI, and they have already commenced their work. We continue to work closely with the RBI and obviously keep them updated on all developments. As we stand today, we are on track, exactly where we thought we wanted to be, maybe even slightly ahead. Our financial estimates around the RBI continue to hold, and it all seems in the kind of place where we thought we would be after the order on April 24. Thirdly, I wanted to talk about the business. Devang will of course take you through the numbers in detail.
As I mentioned at last quarter's result, the RBI order would affect our Kotak 811 and credit card businesses, that there would also be a period of two to three weeks as we shifted gears from a digital onboarding process to one which was an assisted process. All of this is played out in the quarter exactly as we anticipated, and obviously this has had some impact on, Unsecured book growth and consequently on NIM. Despite that, I'm very pleased to say that we've made very good progress in deepening relationships with our Kotak 811 customers and through enhanced offers to our credit card customers, maintained ENR levels in cards. In fact, market share of spends on the credit card have actually inched up from March, in May.
Because of all of the above, we sincerely believe that when the embargo is lifted, we will come out even more, even more strongly. Exactly as we talked about last quarter, the rest of the business was unaffected and grew really well. The first quarter is always a muted growth, and if you think about it, the bank grew year-on-year at about 2%, our subsidiaries grew at 26%. Within the bank, obviously, if you take out the impact on the Unsecured businesses and Kotak 811 , the rest of the business grew very well. Advances and deposits both grew at around 20% year-on-year. Like I said, our Capital M arket businesses, Asset M anagement businesses, and our C orporate B ank had another stellar quarter. Group AUM crossed INR 636,000 crore.
We have seen the ongoing, the ongoing stress in low-cost deposits, and that is an industry-wide phenomena, and we continue to try and build propositions to counter this. In addition, we have seen a certain level of stress on, in certain pockets on Consumer, Retail Unsecured assets, particularly at the low- ticket levels and in certain segments where the customer has got overleveraged. We are obviously maintaining a very, very sharp focus on these kind of segments. During the quarter, we also made solid progress in defining the next level of granularity in our strategy on transforming for scale. I wrote about this extensively in my first letter to shareholders in our annual report for the period ending March 2024.
Specifically, in this quarter, we have made progress on the One Kotak agenda and in revamping our distribution organization, such that our customers have a seamless, resilient, omni-channel experience. More to come on both of these very important initiatives. At the end of the first quarter, I'm feeling more confident and comfortable that we can really transform our businesses for scale and take them to the next level of success. For now, let me hand it over to Devang to take you through our financial performance.
Thank you, Ashok, and good afternoon, all of you. Before I start the result highlight, I would like to explain two matters which have significant impact on the quarter results, so that all of you have uniform understanding, and hopefully we end up answering questions upfront. The first matter, of course, related to KGI. KGI was a 100% subsidiary of bank. The divestment got completed on 18th June 2024. The divestment in KGI was achieved through a combination of part stake, sale of stake by the bank, as well as issuance of fresh capital by KGI. Therefore, post divestment, the bank holding in KGI stands reduced to 30%. Hence, during the quarter, till the date of divestment, it is accounted as a subsidiary, and post 18th June, it is accounted as associate companies in the consolidation results of the bank.
Bank was holding KGI investment at cost and received total consideration of INR 4,096 crore for part sale of KGI shares, resulting in post-tax profit after netting of direct expenses of INR 2,730 crores in standalone bank's books. Further, in addition to the standalone books, in consolidated accounts, there is a reversal of KGI accumulated losses of INR 284 crores, which is proportionate to the shares sold. Hence, the total pre profit impact of KGI transaction is INR 3,013 crore at consolidated results, which has been disclosed as exceptional item in press table with suitable disclosures. Shanti will, of course, later explain the business rationale and future benefits arising from this transaction. So after the KGI investment, the second one impacting the Q1 result is the implementation of RBI direction on valuation and operations of investment portfolio.
Bank has implemented this direction with effect from first April 2024. As required by the direction, applicable investments have been marked to market using the fair value principles, which erstwhile were accounted at cost. At 30th June , value of these investments has resulted in post-tax gain of INR 3,414 crore, which has been accounted in results as required by the direction. So the INR 3,414 crore is entering the results, which has not gone through the P&L. In the press table, this impact is stated on the date of implementation of this direction, which is 1st April, therefore, you see the figure of INR 2,905 crores. The 3,414 crore is the valuation impact on 30 th June as compared to 31st March .
Hence, while the KGI transaction has an impact on profit and net worth, the investment direction impact is only in the net worth accretion. As you have noticed, we have quantified impact of above matters in applicable P&L related figures and ratios in the investor presentation, which you have. I'll be referring above as KGI transaction and investment direction as I provide further insight to our results and largely focus on performance without considering these matters. While this is accounting, I think as Ashok also stated, both of these value accretion transactions truly reflects the embedded value of Kotak group assets, which continues to create sustainable shareholder value, which we are very proud of. Let me now start with the consolidated numbers, which we disclosed earlier today.
We ended this quarter with consolidated profit of INR 4,435 crore, excluding KGI transaction, which is about 7% higher than the same quarter last year. Our consolidated customer assets, INR 4,94,105 crore, is about 22% higher than the last year. Our capital adequacy at group level, robust 22.8%, with CET1 itself 21.9%, and the book value of our share is INR 710 at 30th June, both of which obviously including the KGI and investment direction. ROE at consolidated level, excluding KGI transaction, is 13.12% and ROA is at 2.30%. We'd like to clarify, if we remove the denominator effect of the KGI investment direction from the ROE computation, the ROE will improve to 13.44%.
We have highlighted that on page six of the investor's presentation. So 13.12% is only after removing from the numerator, the exceptional type, but if you were to rightly compute and remove the effect from the denominator of the net worth as well, it increases to 13.04%. And please remember, this is the transaction of KGI has come towards the end of the quarter, so the next quarter, the impact of that average will be much higher in the ROE. Let me now start with the individual entities, starting with the bank first. Bank contributes about 73% of the group profits, excluding the profit on KGI transactions. The bank ended the quarter with a PAT of INR 3,520 crores, excluding profit on KGI transaction, with a YoY growth of 2%.
Q4 PAT of the bank had one-off credit items aggregating to INR 426 crore, which has been explained on page 10 of the investor presentation. This was also disclosed in our last quarter's investor presentation. At the bank's loan level, too, we have a capital adequacy of 22.4%, with CET1 itself of 21.3%, including KGI and RBI direction. For the quarter, bank's ROA of 2.38%, excluding KGI transaction. Bank's customer assets grew 20% to INR 435,827 crore YoY, and 3% QoQ, with corporate banking contributing significantly to asset growth during quarter one. Unsecured retail slowed down during the quarter due to embargo on credit card and lower disbursement in microcredit loans. Our CASA ratio now at 30th June is 43.4%.
Average total deposits for the year grew by 21% year-over-year, and quarter-over-quarter, 7% growth. Challenges on low-cost deposits continue, with savers turning into investors, deploying money in high-yielding capital market products, which is reflected in our Capital M arket business performance and in increase in cost of funds for the bank. On the NIM, I would like you to focus on the NIM trends for last three quarters. Our NIM for the quarter ended December was 5.22%. For the March quarter, it was 5.28%, it increased, and for the quarter June, it is 5.02%.
So the way I would urge you to look at it is actually 5.22% going to 5.02%, a 20 basis points reduction over two quarters, as the March NIM of 5.8% increased, despite increase in the cost of fund and the CASA challenge, was due to some of the one-off factors, one of them being Sonata acquisition towards the March end. We also had certain liquidity during the beginning of this quarter, which resulted in deploying assets at a lower yield. And of course, the challenges on CASA, as well as slowdown in the high-yield Unsecured business, impacted the yield, increasing the, the reducing the NIM to 5.02%. However, our fees and services continued to grow at a healthy pace of 23% YoY growth in Q1 compared to what we did last year.
Operating costs increased 14% YoY, including annual payroll-related increases during the Q1. Potential cost estimate due to IT embargo, which we had indicated last quarter, is in line with our initial estimate as per the guidance given. Gross NPA at 30th June is 1.39%, with net NPA of 0.35%. Credit cost at the bank increased to 55 basis points annualized, and increase is largely due to losses in unsecured retail books in lower ticket segment and select geography for Microcredit business. Currently, we do not see any stress in non-individual customer segment and secured products. Overall, if we are to conclude the bank results, the Q1 performance normalized on backdrop of generally a high performance year-end quarter, as well as last year Q1, which had been at unsustainable level and lower credit cost. Now let me come to performance of select subsidiaries.
Kotak Securities and Kotak AMC continue to perform well, with growth in capital markets increasing their contribution to the overall group profits. Kotak Securities recorded YoY 83% growth in profit, to INR 400 crore, with increase in market volume. Kotak AMC made profit of INR 175 crore, up 65% compared to last year, with increase in average AUM in equity to INR 268,567 crore, YoY growth of 61%. International subsidiaries also benefited from growth in capital markets and increase in flow, contributing to INR 68 crore profit compared to INR 32 crore as compared to previous year. KMCC profit was INR 81 crore for the quarter, against INR 55 crore last year. Kotak Mahindra Investments profit increased by 35% to INR 138 crore, primarily due to growth in advances.
Kotak Prime, which is into Passenger Car Finance business, customers asset grew to INR 35,893 crore with a YoY growth of 21%. PAT for Q1 was INR 232 crore, with a tad increase in provisions. Both NBFC, which is Kotak Prime, as well as Kotak Investments, are very well capitalized, with a capital adequacy ratio of 24.6% and 30.1% respectively. BSS Microfinance Business C orrespondent entity has ended quarter with a lower post-tax profit of INR 50 crore, as against INR 95 crore in the same quarter previous year. This is mainly due to lower disbursement, higher branch expansion costs, besides increasing delinquencies in select states. I must mention, BSS net worth is INR 1,060 crore as at 30th June, 2024.
Kotak Life profitability got impacted on higher distribution costs and ended the quarter with a PAT of INR 174 crore, as against INR 193 crore same quarter last year. We continue to maintain high solvency ratio of 2.48x, as against the regulatory requirement of 1.5x. With this, I complete the overview of subsidiary and bank's stand-alone performance, and hand over to Shanti for business update. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Devang. I should have started by saying quarter one is a muted quarter, and we also had some impact of the RBI Embargo on certain businesses. In the backdrop of that, the bank saw good growth in its advances and average deposits. The bank's customer assets grew 20% YoY and 3% during the quarter. If you look at the segments, Consumer B ank growth was at 20% YoY and 3% quarter-on-quarter. Commercial Bank at 20% YoY and 1% quarter-on-quarter, impact of the Microfinance business. SME, C orporate B ank, including credit substitutes, grew 20% YoY and 4% quarterly. Commercial Bank includes the Sonata acquisition. Let me talk about the highlights in each of the segments, and I will start with the Consumer segment and on the asset side.
Our Mortgage L ending business continues to grow well, with a YoY growth of 17% and QoQ growth of 4%. We have also seen improvement in yield in the incremental lending during the quarter. Performance of the portfolio continues to be robust, reflecting strong quality. Unsecured retail p roducts grew 25% YoY, but were flat quarter on quarter because of the impact of the embargo. Credit cards grew mainly because of the spends increase. We could not issue new cards in the quarter post April 24th, but we still managed to maintain the book because of the spends increase. Personal Loans also was flat because we had to move some acquisition from digital to assisted journey, and we lost a few days. Happy to say that we are back with that.
So as a result of that, those volumes have been flat, while the secured businesses have done well. In the credit card space, we do see some buildup of stress in the industry, largely due to leveraging at the customer end and to a lesser extent in Personal Loans. And keeping that in mind, we have tightened some of our credit policy norms, in the recent vintages to align our risk appetite. On the Business Banking side, in the Consumer Bank, there was an increase in geographical presence, and we have seen significant increase in our footprint as well as business, and the business grew at 26% YoY and 4% QoQ. Demand was actually robust, especially on the manufacturing side and some amount due to the price increases in commodities.
Our portfolio continues to be healthy on the delinquencies, both in secured and unsecured segments in the Business B anking area, and we are beginning to see the demand for some amount of CapEx in this segment for increasing capacity. Let me now move to the Commercial A ssets. The Commercial V ehicles industry saw a growth of only 2% YoY in Q1, and a 16% de-growth QoQ. In this segment, the demand for passenger bus continued, and whereas a good segment de-grew. We have grown more than 20% YoY in this quarter in unit as well as in our disbursement, thus helping us improve our market share. Collection efficiency continues to remain stable. While we have seen some stress at the lower end of the segment, overall we have done well, and we will continue to grow our book and market share in this segment.
Construction Equipment industry in the quarter saw a moderate growth while it has grown YoY. Our disbursements grew at 16%, and again, it helped us gain market share. Collections and books in this segment were stable, and we think that, with the government's allocation to infrastructure, which we expect in the budget, this segment is well filled, and we will continue to focus as well as grow our business in this segment. Tractor industry was flat YoY, and our disbursements were in line with the industry. The Used T ractor business witnessed very good growth of 20% in the first quarter. This helped us strengthen the relationship with the existing customer and deepen them, as well as acquire customers. This is an important segment for us, given our market share, and we will continue to maintain focus in this segment. Let's get to Microcredit.
Post the acquisition of Sonata, the Microcredit business of the bank, we are now present in 16 states with a customer base of 27 lakhs. Because of this, we saw an overall growth. QoQ was muted for many reasons: heat wave, some delinquencies in some states, and also the elections had some impact. We are focused on working on strengthening our operations and introducing more technology and controls in this business. We will continue to monitor delinquencies and keep our focus on growth within the framework that we have put out. We expect continued demand from rural and semi-urban customers, and we plan to grow this business in line with the industry. Let me turn to the Wholesale B ank. In line with the larger strategy transforming for scale, the W holesale Bank has identified a medium- to long-term strategy with increasing market share and profitable and sensible growth.
Focused on increased product holding, transaction banking, and capturing a large share of the non-risk income and thus focused on higher ROEs. This quarter, our Wholesale advances, including the SME and mid-market businesses in the corporate bank, grew at 6% QoQ and 21% YoY. Our credit substitute book, though, saw a little bit of a de-growth. Our portfolio metrics remains very healthy, with negligible credit costs. Capturing a higher share of trade and transaction flows is a key component of our strategy. Our trade assets during the quarter grew very well, driven by both domestic and export trade. Our supply chain book also grew significant, coming largely from NTB clients. Our focus continues to be granular in the SME and mid-market segments. In the SME, we have been able to acquire record customers in Q1, and this helped us grow advances by 21% YoY.
In our mid-market business as well, we have ramped up franchise through new customer acquisition, and almost all the growth is coming from granular working capital business. Thus, the shift in focus in the Corporate B ank is very clear. Among the larger corporates, we saw the demand uptake across almost all of our segments. And in the transaction b anking segment, we were able to cross-sell, deepen, capture fee income, including in FX, debt capital markets, and our current account businesses, which I'll talk about in a little later. Technology continues to be important, and since our flagship digital offering to the corporate customers continue to show good adoption and usage rates. Overall, the franchise and business remains healthy and with healthy ROEs. Let me now turn to Liabilities. The average total deposits of Devang had said grew 21%, driven largely—
21% YoY and 7% QoQ, driven largely by term deposits, 38% YoY. Savings continue to be a challenge, and I think the saver to investor momentum continues, and especially after elections, this has accentuated. We have focused on, and I'll talk about some of the initiatives that will help us grow our savings. The ActivMoney, which has contributed a lot on the YoY growth, was flat this quarter, and we will continue to focus on that as a strategy. We've taken certain steps and initiatives that will help us enhance our deposit franchise. We have simplified the savings product booking, bundled propositions for certain very key segments, and focused on value and propositions as we go into the quarter for acquisition of customers.
We relaunched ActivMoney in this quarter with an outreach program, and we expect that to help us garner deposits and pay dividends over the next few quarters. We also launched a micro-market strategy on segment-specific offerings in the top 25 cities, and this will help us shore up deposits as we get into the next few quarters. On the current account side, very clear bundled propositions for the Business Banking solutions have also been launched. So we will continue to focus on deposits. While term deposits continue to grow well, CASA and ActivMoney will be a very important focus area as we get into the next, this quarter and the next. On the Wholesale side liability, custody flows were very strong this quarter, driven by market buoyancy and marquee acquisitions, both offshore and in the domestic market.
Tax payments, we were able to penetrate into our customers significantly this quarter. GST payments were at an all-time high. We also improved our penetration in the cash management side, particularly in our asset customers and with higher trade flows, expect benefited the CASA balances and expect this to continue to benefit as we get into the next year. I think the Devang talked about the subsidiaries and the growth of the capital market subsidiaries, among others. I will now request the operator to open for Q&A.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session.
You can.
We proceed now with the question and answer session.
Yes.
Anyone wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to please use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Kunal Shah from Citigroup. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi. So firstly, on the growth front, so if you look at on incremental basis, largely out of, say, INR 13,000 crore-INR 14,000 crore kind of a growth, almost like INR 10,000 crore coming from the low-yielding Corporate as well as the Home Loans. And, given that this is just the first quarter impact, on the unsecured, and you indicated that credit cost, or credit card stress is also rising. So do we see maybe now the tilt being more towards the secured compared to unsecured? And, our guidance of 15% unsecured, maybe that could be relatively, lower in the coming quarters, the way we saw decline this quarter as well.
Yeah, Kunal, let me take that, and Shanti, if you could kind of pipe in, right? So look, by definition, during the first quarter, because of the RBI order, we couldn't grow our unsecured book. Obviously, we didn't, you know, put on any new additional cards, nor did the digital journey for the PL, kind of thing work for us. So actually, as a percentage of total advances, unsecured loans, retail unsecured L oans have actually dipped by 20 basis points. But, you know, our goal to kind of get to mid-teens on our unsecured retail book continues, and hopefully we get back to that, back to marching towards that goal once the embargo is lifted. Are we at, Shanti, anything you'd add?
Yeah. So I just want to say two, three things, Kunal. Firstly, if you look at the Corporate, their focus has sharply increased in the SME and the mid-market businesses, and I talked about how we are seeing robust growth there with new acquisitions, and the share of non-risk incomes has actually gone up. Second, on the mortgages, it's not just about H ome L oans, but it's also LAP. We have a very strong market share in LAP, where the yields are higher. And I also mentioned that during this quarter, both in Home L oans and LAP, we've actually been able to see an increase in use. So, from a secured asset perspective, working capital businesses, whether it's in the C onsumer B ank, whether it's in the Wholesale Bank and the M ortgages, which is LAP and H ome L oans, have grown.
Unsecured businesses, Retail, we continue to maintain a strategy of moving towards the mid-teen, but as Ashok said, credit c ards and PL, we could not grow. Credit c ard remains a very important and strategic product as a part of our customer proposition, and once the embargo is lifted, we will be back and we'll be growing these businesses.
Sure. And, secondly, on margins, so if you look at excess of the interest on IT refund, maybe the impact which has been there of almost 16- odd basis points, maybe on a calculated basis, it suggests like there is like half impact on account of yield contraction, and half of it is on account of cost of deposits. So would that be the right assumption, even when we look at it on a maybe on a reported basis to give cost of funds, but purely looking at the cost of deposits and yield on advances, could there be a similar kind of an impact?
Sure. So, Kunal, just to correct you, the interest on IT refund was not considered for calculation on NIM, because the NIM is calculated on average earning assets, so it was anyway not considered last quarter.
I think the last quarter NIM actually got impacted because of also the Sonata transaction, which we disclosed.
Yeah.
We did it on 28th of March, so where the average effects were lower and the interest income came for a larger period. So that gives us some kicker on that, right? But you are right in terms of this quarter. It's a mixture of increasing cost of fund, which we have now disclosed. If you see, it has moved from, you know, the cost of fund has increased and also the, the cost, the increase, I mean, the reduction in the yield on the advances which got impacted by the share of unsecured advances, which dipped, as per the reasons mentioned by Ashok and Shanti. So both of them have impacted the yield. But as I said again, I think the way to look at it is, March was a bit of aberration.
The right way to perhaps look it is, the September NIM, which is 5.22%, going down to 5.02%, is about 20 basis points, which is the case.
NIM guidance continue at 5%, plus maybe trying to sustain it over 5-odd%?
No. So we will of course, try to, see how it goes. Obviously, the liquidity, if it eases out, will help us. And of course, how do we, you know, progress on the low-cost deposit strategy, as well as how the Personal Loans. All of those factors will actually, I think, impact that. Obviously, the biggest question is the repo rate, how, how it moves also will impact. So it's very difficult to say as of now how it will work.
Okay, okay. Thanks. Thanks a lot, and all the best. Yeah.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Rahul Jain from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.
Hi, good evening, everyone. Had a bunch of questions. First off, start with on the growth bit, you know, quite pleasantly surprised that, you know, first quarter typically is a weak quarter given seasonality and, you know, management pushed up the growth momentum. So, is this more like the opportunities presented for itself? Because the Corporate, you know, which has been one of the drivers for growth, we keep hearing that the, you know, pricing is quite, you know, ridiculous, if I may say so. So was it because the opportunities were unique to your bank that, you know, we pursued that growth? And how sustainable would this be at an aggregate level also, as well as the Corporate bit, the growth momentum?
Yeah. So, so Rahul, I'll make some kind of opening comments, and then Paritosh is here with me, and maybe he can talk to you about the Corporate. Frankly, from my perspective, I think the, our Corporate team has done a really nice job, of pushing the agenda. Like Shanti mentioned, they've defined like a three-year plan. We are very, very focused on where there's growth in the economy, who is the right people to go after, and building it out. And building it out, in a sense, with a very sharp focus on return on equity. So this is not about just lending at any rate.
This is about actually cultivating, proper corporate relationships, building out the mid-market book, building out the SME book, and this is a focus that we are going to continue, and hopefully continue with far greater vigor as the quarters get along. But let me have Paritosh, comment on it as well.
Yeah, thanks. So, we have been focusing a lot on building our trade and transaction banking book, and Shanti mentioned that both trade and supply chain have grown significantly in this quarter. We have looked at our numbers, and trade active customers give us far larger CA, and also it gives us significant upside in FX revenue. And hence, doing more trade and more and larger focus on transaction banking helps us both on liabilities as well as in the fee income. We also keep very significant focus on having the right mix of risk and non-risk income from our corporate customers.
So while I agree with you, there is a significant pressure on spreads in the Corporate segment, however, we are meeting that gap by getting a higher share of transaction banking and cash, and FX from those customers.
Yeah. I just want to add that in the Consumer Bank, you talked about the Corporate. So working capital businesses are growing very robustly in addition to the Mortgages business. The Business Banking, both secured and u nsecured.
Got it.
So, just a follow on: So does it mean that the growth focus is going to be a lot more sharper, Ashok, under your leadership, and we should see more and more market share gains to come through in the subsequent quarters from here on? Because first quarter you've done, you know, this kind of a growth. So technically, as the business momentum picks up in the economy, would Kotak be now able to show us a much larger gains in market share?
Rahul, my whole hypothesis has all been about how we are going to transform for scale. Scale, not for the size of say, but scale for the size of relevance, right? So whether it is our Consumer business, whether it's our Commercial business or whether it's our Corporate business, we are developing our plans, right, to get to scale, right? Now, Consumer business, the unsecured part has hit a bit of a speed bump because of the RBI order. But clearly, we are looking, our whole strategy is dedicated upon driving, transforming for scale.
Got it. Thanks. Just moving to the margins a bit, you know, clearly, I think the quarter-on-quarter downtick was slightly surprising, because we thought that the cost of funds bottomed out last couple of quarters, or at least a quarter back. But we've seen, of course, the pressure building up again. Devang also made this point about the margins earlier were at an unsustainable level. So can we just get some idea as to, you know, when you think about the profitability or margins in context of growth, what is, what, you know, how should we think about it if it is unsustainable?
Or if it was unsustainable, are we now at the right level, or you still see some more pressure, in the margins or there could be some mix-driven impact on yields that we can see in the, in the coming quarters?
Yeah. So, Rahul, I think what Devang said was that two quarters back, at 5.28%
5.20%
5.20% and then going to 5.28%, that was kind of unsustainable with the cost of funds going up. Look, Rahul, there is no question, there is a, and, you know, everybody from the governor downwards has talked about how the war for deposits is on. Obviously, we are participating in that kind of thing. Our effort is, how do we continue to build out a deposit franchise, a broad-based deposit franchise, across all our businesses, to be able to make sure that we have not only a sustainable deposit growth, which helps us grow our business and scale, but also get those deposits at the right cost. Year-on-year deposit growth, I would say, is a tick. Is, I would say that the cost has been, you know, one would have hoped that we had a better kind of CASA ratio.
But that is the sole focus or the number one focus, may I say, as a management team, as we, how we kind of drive that. We are working on multiple initiatives in that regard. Hopefully you'll see a new ad on ActivMoney on air tomorrow, which has also worked very, very well for us, and other propositions that will start going through. Let's see how the market develops. Let's see how the capital markets do, right? You know, once, if God forbid, there is a bump, you will see a return to a more normalized deposit environment as well. Let's see what happens in the budget as to what kind of changes kind of come through there. So right now, while there are a whole bunch of things which are difficult to predict, right?
Our number one focus is on trying to build these propositions that will help us contain, to sustain deposit growth and deposit growth at a low cost.
Got it. So, again, sorry to belabor, but is there some more deposit repricing that is still left in the books? Or as we've repriced some of the deposits now, you know, given this war analogy that is given, we could continue to see some more repricing go through in this year?
Yeah.
Where are we in that cycle?
Let me pick that up. Yeah, I think our deposits are largely repriced, and I think the rates have stabilized. I think our two more data points, I think, despite all this, we continue to be at the highest, I think, CASA ratio, I would like to believe. I think this equity profit on sale of KGI transactions should also help some amount of liquidity going forward, I think.
Yeah.
But yes, right now, as Ashok said, the war is on, and we have to fund our balance sheet as well. So the challenge obviously is how do we get the low-cost deposit to fund the growth in the balance sheet?
On the asset side, a lot of it is linked, right? Linked, pricing. So-
Yes.
Whenever repricing happens, every time there's a change.
Yes.
Just want to squeeze in one or two more questions. So, you upped your branch expansion guidance, as we've read in the media, to 150-200 branches now every year. So, is there a target number do we have as to what should be the branch number now over the next three years or so, if you can share with us? And also in that context, what kind of cost to income ratio that you're looking at? Do we still see scope for any improvement in that number? Because that number has been elevated now for a long time.
So, Rahul, like we mentioned last quarter also, look, we're not going to become a primary branch-based bank. That's not gonna happen. But branches and a physical network will continue to be a very important part of our distribution network. We believe that by blanketing the top 68 cities with the current kind of branch infrastructure, and by making the branch a One Kotak kind of asset, which is accessed by or leveraged by the SME business, the Commercial businesses, as well as the Consumer businesses, we will be able to get the maximum impact for our branches. Now, tentatively, we put in a number of somewhere between 3,000 and 3,500 branches in a kind of five-year timeframe.
The speed at which we go, the pace at which we execute, the refurbishments that we do, is all a function of what kind of response we get and how quickly we get it right. But we will increase our branch network. We were doing about 150, it goes to about 200, and later on to about 250 branches, till we get to that number of between 3,000 to 3,500 in a four- to five-year timeframe.
So therefore, cost to income would remain elusive?
No, if you know, look at the other way, the branches will also generate revenues, both balance sheet revenues as well as, you know, fees.
So I don't think, I don't think we are seeing or we are projecting any kind of significant pickup in cost-income ratio. In fact, what we are saying is, when we are transforming for scale and really bringing technology to play, we hope to make a dent over the next four to five years in our cost-income ratio.
Got it. Thank you so much, and, kudos to your team for managing this quarter. Cheers.
Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, in order that the management is able to address questions from all participants in the queue, we request you to please restrict your questions to one per participant. We have the next question from the line of Chintan Joshi from Autonomous. Please go ahead.
Hi, good morning, or rather, good afternoon. Can I ask on the work that is being done to address the RBI Embargo, if you could give us-
One minute, you're not very clear. Can you just be a little clear?
Yeah. Can we be softer?
Not clear.
Hi. Hopefully, this is better.
Yeah, much better.
Yeah, sorry about that. So, if I can check on the timeline of the work that needs to be done on the RBI Embargo, could you give us some sense of, you know, optimistically or pessimistically, what the timeline range looks like before you put the ball back in the RBI's court?
So see, Chintan, this is. First of all, there is a defined scope of work, which we've kind of talked about. That defined scope of work is what we've talked about the RBI and said, you know, what will put us into, may not be a platinum level of standard, but let's say a very good gold level of standard. The RBI has also told us, and we have been assured, that, "Look, it's not as if we're going to wait till you finish every single thing before we lift the embargo." They want us to demonstrate ongoing progress, they want us to demonstrate sustainability, and they want us to demonstrate commitment. I would submit to you that in the first quarter, we have definitely demonstrated progress.
Commitment, my God, we are working on this like no other, and our technology teams have really worked very hard on this, right? So there's strong level of commitment, and that commitment we've shown by the resources that we've added, and I think the RBI is aware of that. At what stage in this, in this journey, the RBI gets comfortable, right, is very hard to predict. All I'm trying to say is, hey, we will continue with, with incredible gusto down that path. The way I'm thinking about this is, at the end of this, we will have a phenomenal technology platform, right? One that we can scale, one that has resilience, one that, you know, we can feel very confident to match growth.
Simultaneously with this, as the technology teams are working very, very, very hard on this, it's my job to try and convince the RBI that the conditions which they want, the milestones that we have kind of committed, are walking through. As of from April 24th to June 30th, or even July 20th, all the milestones that we said we will hit, we have hit, right? In fact, in certain cases, we may also be slightly ahead, right? Now, when exactly the RBI will say, you know, we are-
Maybe, maybe I can ask that, ask that another way. How about I ask you, you know, as a percentage of like, you know, items that need to be completed, say, 100%, how much have you completed? Because some things may take longer, some things may be faster. At least that might give us some sense of timing then, if you don't want to be pinned on timing for the moment, which I completely understand.
Yeah. Chintan, I know what you're looking for, but it's very hard. And I tell you one thing: First of all, the RBI is not saying, "If you hit 60%, I'll let you, I'll lift the embargo," or something. So the percentage of completion from an RBI perspective is not very relevant. And then complete— I mean, look, I can tell you there's a list of 327 items or 356 items or 400 items. One item is not necessarily equal to the other, right?
Okay.
So again, I would tell you that-
I appreciate.
Obviously, the easier stuff we complete faster and complete much, much, much quicker, right? I think what we have to do is demonstrate to the RBI that the change that we are putting through is completely sustainable. That would mean it takes a little longer. I would submit to you that we've got to demonstrate that we're totally committed. I think we have done that, and we will continue to do that, right? And we've got to demonstrate progress, which means April 24th to July, call it, 24th, three months. We are keeping them totally up to date, totally up to date on every single kind of milestone, right?
Understood.
In the meantime, Chintan, we are also gearing up that when we get out of the embargo, how can we come out stronger? And by the way, while it affected us in this quarter for two or three weeks, switching from pure digital journeys to physical and assisted journeys, we've done that. So you know, we are trying to mitigate the impact as much as possible. So it's a multipronged attack, which we've kind of gone on.
Sure. And then second question would be on costs. Should we expect some cost inflation to meet some of these tech demands this year? You know, I don't know how you would like to give that message, cost to asset or cost income or just an absolute number, but some idea of the extra cost involved would be helpful.
So I think, Chintan, we have given the estimate, and I think we have also confirmed in this update that we are well within the estimate which we have given earlier.
So you're happy with that guidance from last quarter?
Yeah. So as far as cost is concerned, I think, we will continue to spend what we have been spending on IT, within the overall OpEx which we incur. And as we progress on that, I think some of the benefits of the past spend will start coming in. And, you know, so for a year or two, the costs will remain at an elevated level, for the spend which we have emphasized.
Understood. Thank you.
Thank you. Participants, you are requested to please restrict your questions to one per participant. We have the next question from the line of Param Subramanian from Nomura. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi. Thanks for taking my question. My first question is to Ashok. Ashok, you started off your commentary talking about subsidiaries and you know, the deal that we did this quarter. And you said that, you know, we will be looking— Going ahead, you will be looking at, you know, similar partnerships wherever they are lucrative and make sense to the bank. Now, is this now, going ahead, considering that, you know, the bank has excess capital, our ROEs are less than 14% even this quarter, how do you plan, you know, how do you plan to, you know, juxtapose those two things where, you know, the bank doesn't need capital, and at the same time, we are looking to, say, add a few partnerships in terms of the substitutes?
Yeah, that's my first question.
Yeah. So, I've spent a lot of time, kind of thinking about this, right? And let me try and do this. Look, there's no doubt we have excess capital, and I would say excess capital is a good thing, okay? Excess capital is a good thing. Why is excess capital a good thing? Because it helps us take advantages of any kind of opportunities that may arise from an inorganic perspective, and God forbid there's a downturn, we can weather that, right? So generally speaking, excess capital and having a fortress balance sheet is a good thing. The question is how much and how we are thinking about it. And what I would like to submit to you, and I think it came out very strongly in this quarter, you know, you are helped sometimes and you're helped by an accounting change.
I never dreamt I'll get helped by that with an accounting change. The real question is: How is that excess capital being deployed, right? And if you think about how our excess capital is being deployed currently, you know, what we are doing is we are actually making investments in our alternative investments, alternative asset investment business, right? There, if you can show our other LPs that we have actually got skin in the game, you get a very, very good kind of response. So as you know, we've got about $9 billion of assets in that business. And we contribute rough numbers, and of course, there are ins and outs and there are sales and stuff like that, so don't do the math, but it's about 15% that we contribute.
That business generates a high teen, very high teen kind of IRR. So that is a great return for that excess capital. The second thing that we do with the excess capital is really make investments in financial market infrastructures, right? And you've seen the pretty significant number that Devang talked to you about that got added, added to our results this year, in this quarter, actually, because of the embedded value of those investments. Again, if you translate that into a return, that is a very good return on our excess capital. And as we start thinking more and more about how we, how we are investing our excess capital, we, the return on that excess capital will actually, between... Obviously, if we invest in our business, we'll get the best return.
But carrying a little bit of insurance premium, I would submit to you, is a good thing, and we will borrow the cost of carrying that kind of excess capital, right? And now with this accounting standard, frankly, you will be able to see the benefit of that quarter on quarter on quarter, right? And we are on the lookout, like every other business, to see what other kind of inorganic opportunities are there, to be able to participate and transform for scale. We are constantly talking to our businesses, and all our businesses know that they have the primary raw material for growth, which is capital, right? So that is not a kind of, a binding factor for them.
That's why I think we can get into a, you know, start talking to you about a much better position around our excess capital and the return that that capital makes, and hence, the overall return that the firm makes.
Fair enough, Ashok, but we would like just, you know, following up, just like, you know-
We request you to please return to the queue for follow-up questions. Thank you. The next question is on the line of Mahrukh Adajania from Nuvama. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi. I just want, I had a question on credit cost and on the unsecured debt. So on credit cost, now, do we see it settling at around 60 basis points? Is that a fair assumption to make even for the future quarters? Because last quarter, in the fourth quarter, that is, there were some reversals on standard provisions, but those have been possibly exhausted now. So is that the range? Is that the correct range to look at, 60 basis points?
Yeah. So Mahrukh, let me give you, let me give you the way I'm looking at it, and then maybe Devang can help kind of quantify to that extent, right? So first of all, I think the credit cost is a total cost number, and you should kind of think about it in different buckets. Frankly, on the corporate side of the house, touch wood, credit remains very, very benign and actually working very well. Now, what is happening there is that the level of recovery that we were making post-COVID have actually have started coming down a little bit, while, you know, actual new credit costs are close to zero recovery. So instead of being a massive negative number, it is a smaller negative number. On the secured side in Retail, no issues at all.
Very similar, similar commentary to what I just talked about on the corporate side. Every other part of the business, credit cost pretty good. In unsecured retail, there's definitely. We are definitely seeing signs of stress in two areas. One, we are definitely seeing a bit of stress in the lower ticket kind of unsecured credit card, not PL, credit card. And then in credit card, we are definitely seeing some level of stress, where the customers are getting overleveraged. Our hypothesis in this regard is that banks coming out of COVID suddenly realized that it's a pretty benign kind of situation and doubled up very aggressively on credit in areas which were traditionally safe, and therefore, there has been some level of over-leveraging within the system. We are very, very focused on these areas.
We've created specialized collections team to work that, and hopefully, we won't see a tick-up from here on, as we manage our way through it. Now, obviously, how the environment develops and what happens generally in the industry is something that we're going to keep a very close watch on.
Yeah, but only just one clarification, the credit cost is computed only for the specific provisions, you know? You mentioned that on page 14, and the figures are comparable. So 0.65% is only on specific provisions, does not include standard provisions.
Yes, yes, of course. And just one follow-up question-
I request you to please return to the queue for further questions. Thank you. The next question is from the line of Piran Engineer from CLSA. Go ahead.
Sorry, from the line of?
CLSA.
C-C-CLSA.
CLSA, hi, this is Piran Engineer. Congrats on the quarter. Just a couple of things. Firstly, employee OpEx has undershot, so do these numbers reflect the annual hike, or will we see a jump next quarter? And then secondly, one clarification: so Shanti mentioned about some initiatives on CASA deposits, some bundled product offerings, something in the top 50 cities. So if you could just elaborate on that. Thanks.
So, Piran, the employee costs include the total increments, which we have sort of declared to the employees, so that includes that.
Yeah. Okay.
Yeah. So, on the deposit side, I talked about very focused customer segments and bundled products. These customer segments really are the affluent space, both in the salary as well as the Business Banking, the self-employed customer as a customer, the NR customers, and the early jobbers. We have bundled product offerings that we have already launched, but as we get into the quarter, will be focused. So a very specific segment and product bundling strategy to increase engagement. Some of these product bundling includes your investment, your lending, and other products, et cetera, but this is what I talked about. We said that we are focused on the top 25 cities as far as the micro marketing strategy is concerned for some of these segments.
If you look at the deposit strategy, I think top 68-75 cities is where we'll be very focused on, on rolling out some of these initiatives.
Perfect. That answers it. Thank you, and wish you all the best.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is on the line of Suraj Das from Sundaram Mutual. Please, go ahead.
I can hardly hear you.
We have Suraj Das from Sundaram Mutual Fund.
Better.
Thank you. Yeah. Go, go ahead.
Hi, thanks. Hi, sir, thanks for the opportunity. Just couple of questions. One on this, ActivM oney. While the focus remains on ActivM oney and regular deposits, if I see the percentage of TD Sweep facility in the overall term deposits, that is coming down over the past two quarters. So just wondered your thought there. And similarly, in terms of the number that you give CASA and CD, less than INR 5 crore, that is also as a percentage of total deposits, is coming down over the past, let's say, four, five quarters. So, what is your strategy there? And, one more question, I mean, on the MFI side, I mean, you mentioned, I think, in the opening remarks, that there have been some shifts.
So is it more related to, let's say, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, where probably Sonata is predominantly present, or I mean, any specific geography where you are seeing some kind of shifts? Yeah, that's all from my side.
So, Shanti, you want to cover the deposit side? And we have Manish here. Manish runs our Commercial businesses, and Microfinance falls within his empire, so maybe he can tell you a little bit about the Microfinance business and where we are seeing stresses.
So, firstly, in my opening, this thing on deposits, I did say that in this quarter, ActivMoney was flat. When I look at a YoY basis, we were at a 66% growth, but in this quarter, it is flat. I also said that we have relaunched the campaign this quarter, and we will continue to focus on the way we got the success last year. We relaunched the campaign with a different focus. Yeah, so we will see ActivMoney as a contributor. It not only gets us the deposits, but it also helps us shore up savings. So as far less than INR 5 crore is concerned, it's about 78% from 80%, this is really last year, right? So that's a small marginal drop as far as we are concerned.
I talked about the initiatives that we will be building, and all these initiatives are focused on granular deposits. On Microfinance, you want to talk about the markets? Yeah.
Yes. So Manish would give a brief update on our Microfinance business and then get into the specific question.
Microfinance business, we have presence in about 16 -odd states. The existing business in BSS subsidiary is largely concentrated in five large states, which is Karnataka, followed by Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu, and other states are much smaller. Sonata acquisitions gives us a larger footprint in UP, followed by Bihar and MP. The geographies where we are seeing some degree of increased delinquencies as well as collection-related issues are more in, say, parts of Tamil Nadu, parts of Madhya Pradesh, some pockets of Maharashtra, Bihar. Bihar is not as much as we talk, some parts of UP, Rajasthan.
Now, these are all areas which possibly have been impacted due to the last year, the monsoons were pretty erratic in terms of we saw floods, we also saw pockets of drought. And then, of course, there has been an impact of heat wave in the first quarter of this year, and some degree of restricted movement of people during the course of elections. And hence, some of the northern states were hit largely because of that. Pockets of Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, MP, et cetera, were because of monsoon impact of that as well.
Sure. So basically, between the heat wave, the elections, and stuff like that, obviously, and this is a Manish keeps telling me that this is a business which is a very person-to-person, going to each people's home and stuff like that. We are doubling up on all our collections and stuff like that, so hopefully, you know, we'll see this get into better shape.
Yeah, second half should look better as the monsoons, if the monsoons are normal and economic activity in the rural areas pick up. I guess during the course of the year, we should get there.
Having said that, it is a volatile business, but with a great return.
Um, yes.
It's got a very, very good return, but has volatility.
Great. Yeah.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we request you to please restrict your questions to one per participant. We have the next question from the line of Abhishek Murarka from HSBC. Please go ahead.
Hi, good evening, everyone. Thanks for the opportunity.
Sorry to interrupt, Abhishek, but the line for you is not audible.
Hello?
Yes, please go ahead.
Yeah, I'm audible now?
Yes.
Yeah, thanks. Thanks and good evening to everyone. My question is on LCR. If I look at the number for the last two quarters, it's been building up, so it's gone from 126% to 139%. And when there is a bit of a margin pressure, why are you building up this number? Or is this in preparation for the revised framework, or is this... Do you anticipate any change in classification for deposits? Why are you building up this number? That's what my question is.
Yeah, hi. So, you know, the LCR has built up. It's not a conscious effort we introduced. May I request Paul, our Chief Risk Officer, Group Chief Risk Officer, to kind of deal with this question here? Paul, go ahead.
So, you know, this is not something we are trying to build up. It's a natural consequence of how we are managing our, you know, the assets and the liabilities, and it's just a consequence of all of that. So liquidity is comfortable right now, overall. Right now, Devang and some of the others have mentioned the real question is in terms of the mix, that is the point. So it's not a conscious effort to build it up. Of course, we try and optimize it in various ways, so that does increase it in some ways, but it's no special effort because we're expecting something to come up.
Yeah, exactly. I think-
Just what Paul said, it's really, if you look at the fourth quarter, we got a lot of deposits. If you even see, if you look at a YoY basis, on a quarter basis, we're getting deposits. It's a function of the liquidity that we are setting up. We are not actively building up LCR, and as and when we see deployment opportunities, we continue to build. Yeah.
Sure. Because, yeah, the understanding is that, most banks are making it more efficient. Yeah, sure.
Yeah.
My question has been answered.
Yes.
Thank you.
Yeah, we're working on it currently.
Right.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Suresh Ganapathy from Macquarie Capital. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi. Just couple of, just one question, I mean, because we, we did discuss about this, capital, stuff. Is there a thought that the bank could increase its payout ratio? Because that is something which has never been discussed, and here you will always remain quite well capitalized, even if you assume an 18%-19% kind of a growth for the foreseeable future. So why not give more dividend?
Yeah, Suresh, this goes, this fundamentally goes back to this notion of capital and excess capital. Like I explained, Suresh, the way I look at it is having a fortress balance sheet is a good thing. The fundamental question I'm asking for myself is: Hey, so what is the return that excess capital is giving? I'm submitting to you, Suresh, that the way we are investing it, the return that we are getting actually is a decent return. As you know, we can't show it in the P&L, but this time the accounting has kind of helped us to show you what kind of returns we are getting on this excess capital.
If the cost of the insurance premium is not high, i.e., carrying that excess capital, then having a fortress balance sheet and yet getting a return is a very, very nice position to be at. In fact, as long as I'm being able to deliver that for our shareholders, I think we are in a very, very good position, right?
Sorry, apologies. Just one, one extension of the same question is, your ROE is at 14%, your peers are at 17%, 18%. So somewhere down the line, it is hurting you, that denominator, that base, right? I mean, it's taking time for you to realize some of that excess returns that we are talking about getting flown into the P&L numbers, right? Because we're not talking about for one quarter, we're talking about for the past several years that these ROEs have been lower than some of your peers.
Yeah. But Suresh, that's the point, right? So today, today, in this quarter, because of the accounting change, you've seen how much is thrown into the reserves, right? So it's the embedded value of the investments that are showing up. If you take that, you can actually compute what is the return that we are generating on that excess capital. And I can assure you, you'll be quite pleased that we are generating that kind of return on the excess capital. Now, it's not going through P&L, but a sophisticated investor like you will understand the value of this kind of investment. In fact, I would submit to you, because of this, our stock is very undervalued. Not only, not only are we carrying a fortress balance sheet, we are making those investments and getting you a very good return.
Today, we are actually being able to depict a certain amount of it. Same, this is the same story in KGI. Now, KGI is slightly different from the choice that we've made, right? But the embedded value of the KGI transaction suddenly became known to you in this quarter of whenever we announced the sale. When you see the embedded value in the franchise, it is incredible!
Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Prakhar Sharma from Jefferies. You go ahead.
Thank you, and I hope I'm audible properly.
Yeah, Prakash, go ahead. Sorry, sorry, apologies.
So, very quick question. So, you know, if you look at the margins at 5.0%, they are more or less in line with what it was at, like, 1Q FY 2023, when 4.9% margin was there, and the share of unsecured book was somewhere close to 8%, slightly less than 8%. You are touching almost 12%. So how do you look at the risk-adjusted margins in the way they are behaving? That's question one. And second, on the NPA provisioning level, you moved down from 81% to 75%. 75 is no less, but since the credit, the cost is going up, how do you look at the coverage level? What's the right level for Kotak Bank? Thank you.
So I think on the coverage level, I think we are quite comfortable with having 75% PCR ratio, right? And I think the way we should look at it is also the net NPA, which remains low at 0.35%. So I think we are very comfortable with that. Yes, the credit cost has gone up. I think we have discussed about this, the measures we are taking over it. But as far as the coverage and the net NPA ratio, we are quite comfortable about it.
Correct me if I'm wrong, Devang, but the change in accounting policy that we did would have had some impact on that.
The write-off.
Correct, the write-off, which we did last quarter.
Yeah. So the coverage also is obviously reduced because of the write-off, which we explained in the last quarter. We did it in line with the industry, you know, which we are carrying over a longer period with a recovery pressure. But then we did it in the March an accumulated write-off of close to INR 1,500 crore. So that has also impacted provision coverage ratio. But I think as a philosophy, we are quite comfortable with a PCR of 75%, and as long as the net NPA remains at 0.35%.
Got it. And the first question?
So on the margins, I think this is the way we look at it. Where do we go from here? I think we explained what are the reasons why some of the growth in CASA was muted due to the correction we had to do to the RBI matter. The reason we explained in terms of holding back the unsecured loans growth, which has affected the yield. I think if we take those corrective actions and it does result in you know getting more low-cost deposits and disbursing higher yield unsecured Loans going forward it will have a positive impact on the margin, I think.
It all depends on how does it play out, and of course, how does the you know as a systemic liquidity how it behaves, as well as the repo rate, which is which are all the determining factors which affect the margin. As I said, at this level also, I'd like to believe we are still one of the highest net margin and at the highest CASA ratio.
Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will take that as the last question for today. I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Ashok Vaswani for closing comments. Over to you, sir.
Yeah. So, first of all, thank you so much for being with us this afternoon. I hope we have explained the results. It has been a very, very busy period for the management team, but I hope we'll give you a sense of the solid progress that we've made and how we are putting steps into place to really transform our business for scale. So thank you. Much, much, much appreciated.
Thank you. On behalf of Kotak Mahindra Bank, that concludes this conference. Thank you all for joining us. You may now disconnect your lines.