Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to the CDSL Limited Q3 FY 2022 earnings call hosted by Axis Capital Limited. 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 the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star and then zero on your touchtone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. Please note that CDSL does not provide specific revenue or earnings guidance. Anything said on this call which reflects CDSL's outlook for the future or which could be construed as forward-looking statement must be reviewed in conjunction with the risk that the company faces. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Anshuman Singh. Thank you, and over to you.
Thank you, Mike. Good morning, everyone. On behalf of Axis Capital.
Ladies and gentlemen, good day.
A very warm welcome to the Q3 FY.
Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to the CDSL Limited.
We have the management team of CDSL represented by Mr. Nehal Vora, MD and CEO, Mr. Girish Amesara, the CFO, Ms. Naina Ovalekar, Chief Regulatory Officer, Mr. Ram Kumar, Chief of Business Operations, Mr. Vinay Madan, Chief Risk Officer, Mr. Sunil Alvares, MD and CEO, CDSL Ventures, and Mr. Nilesh Kittur, AVP. Without further ado, I would like to hand over the conference to the management for their opening remarks, post which we can open the floor for Q&A. Thank you, and over to you, Nehal, sir.
Yeah. Thank you so much, Anshuman. I would like to wish everybody a good morning, and I would welcome you all to CDSL's third quarter conference call for the financial year 2021-2022. I hope each of you and your loved ones are safe and healthy. I'm joined by the management team of CDSL Group. As in the previous quarters, we posted a detailed financial presentation on our website for your reference. Our strong performance in the December 2021 quarter is a direct result of deliberate steps we've taken towards strengthening our role in the financial ecosystem. The revised strategy of empowering the registered investors and providing services that are convenient and easy enabled us to do more and retain our existing clients.
We are happy to report that India has strengthened its overall participation in the Indian securities market as the overall number of registered investors, or as we call it, the Atmanirbhar Niveshak, as on 8 February 2022, was 9.6 crore unique client codes on the stock exchanges, which is a 57% increase from the same time of the previous year. Further, the total number of Demat accounts across both the depositories in India as on January 31, 2022, stood at 8.4 crores, while CDSL enjoyed a 70% market share at 5.85 crores. We are harnessing the benefits of a digital innovation and the presence carved out across years, especially in the Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities.
We have invented and invested in our business to build a truly diversified organization that performs across market regulations and with a commitment to serving the investors, all market infrastructure institutions, regulators, shareholders, and employees. Speaking further on our business performance during the last three months, the number of new active beneficial owner accounts with CDSL has increased by about 91 lakhs. The comparative number of new beneficial owners for the quarter ending December 31, 2020, was approximately 28 lakhs, and approximately 68 lakhs had increased in the quarter ending December 31, 2021. The number of active companies as on December 31, 2021, was 17,748, which is an 11% year-on-year increase from 15,992.
For the same periods in comparison, the value of securities in Demat custody increased by 47% to INR 37 lakh crore at CDSL as on 31st December 2021 from INR 25 lakh crore as on 31st December 2020. We continue to provide services in line with transformation and the requirements of the current times to promote digital initiatives as promoted by the central government. Further, towards our efforts to make investors self-sufficient, to make informed decisions, the CDSL Investor Protection Fund had conducted 88 investor awareness programs in association with SEBI, other MIIs, and depository participants. Before I hand it over to our CFO, Mr. Girish Amesara, I'd just like to say that the growth of the Indian securities market is an extremely encouraging sign, showing and is expected to show its true potential.
I also want to take a brief moment to place our appreciation and gratitude to all our stakeholders, the regulators, depository participants, investors, issuers and other market participants, a s well as the employees for their constant faith in us. Now, I request our CFO, Girish, to take us through our financial performance. Over to you, Girish.
Thank you, Nehal. Good morning, everyone. Speaking on our financials, we have seen a healthy growth in this quarter within year-on-year performance, with respect to net profit in terms of 55% increase. The total consolidated income for the December 2021 quarter has increased by INR 59.73 crores, which is 58%, compared to December 2020 quarter. In absolute value terms, we have achieved INR 162.93 crores total income compared to INR 103.29 crores during the previous year same quarter. The consolidated net profit after tax for the December 2021 quarter has increased by INR 29.60 crores, which is 55% growth over previous year same quarter.
The absolute amount in value terms, it is INR 83.63 crores, compared to INR 54.03 crore previous quarter. On a standalone basis, the total income for the December quarter has increased by INR 40.30 crore, which is 50% over previous year's same quarter. The absolute value is achieved at INR 121.55 crore compared to INR 81.25 crore for December 2020 quarter. The standalone net profit after tax for the December 2021 quarter has increased by roughly INR 20.74 crore, which is 48% increase. In terms of absolute value numbers, the amount is at INR 63.77 crores during December 2021 quarter compared to INR 43.02 crore for December 2020 quarter.
Now I will hand over the rest to Sunil Alvares to take you through our operations of our wholly-owned subsidiary, CDSL Ventures Limited. Over to you, Sunil. Thank you.
Good morning, everyone. CVL had a very healthy performance in the last quarter. On the back of buoyant markets, the KYC creation increased by 160% to INR 111 crore. The KYC fetch in CVL increased by 165% to INR 2.5 crore. The CKYC business increased by 83% to 15.19 lakh records. In terms of RTAs, we have about 802 companies registered as of 31 December. On the GSP, there was a slight drop in the number of records processed as compared to the previous year.
On the operational income side for the period April to December 2021, we had income of INR 99.35 crores as against 48.69 crores during the period of April to December 2020. The total income, including other income, was 109 crores as compared to 58.92 crores in the same period last year. With regard to expenses, it was at 36 crores this year as compared to 21.17 crores last year. Based on that, the profit before tax was 70.54 crores this year as compared to 37.74 crores last year, which is an increase of about 87%.
On the profit after tax, the total profit after tax for this year was INR 53.60 crores as against INR 29.36 crores, which is a jump of 83%. With this, I'll hand over back to Axis Capital to take over the questions.
Thank you. We will now begin the question- and- answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on your touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we'll wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. We have the first question from the line of Mr. Prakash Kapadia from Anived Portfolio Managers. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Thanks for the opportunity. Congrats on a good set of numbers. Couple of questions from my end. You know, I was just trying to understand more from Sunil Alvares. He mentioned about, you know, the KYC business doing well. If I look at nine months performance of CVL, you know, as per segment, revenues are up 104%. Could you give some more, you know, understanding? Is there some reduction in discounts? Has, you know, pricing improved? Has, you know, contribution of new folios increased as compared to the fetches? And you know, what would be, say the contribution from newer initiatives? If you could give some more insights, that'll be helpful.
Yeah. So far as pricing is concerned, there is pressure on the creation. We currently see a leverage to charges. One is on the creation and one is on the fetch. There has been pressure on the creation charges with the increase in volumes. The fetch charges have more or less remained the same. With the increase in volumes of fetch, that has added to the performance of CVL.
Okay. Okay.
I hope that answers okay.
It's the core business of fetching new records which is driving the growth.
Yeah. It's like, what, you know, records get added at the end of the day at some point or the other hit at fetch. Our bottom market, the number of fetches would obviously increase. That would help, you know, the income grow at that point in time.
Any number of client records or folios you can share?
As per December, we had 3.29 crore KYC records in CVL.
Okay. Understood. That's helpful. Second, you know, if I look at our other expenditure for the nine months, could you now, Girish, comment on, you know, what heads are we seeing? Because there has been a 77%-78% increase in other expenditure, except for, you know, employee and the system maintenance costs. Because you know, last year there were some one-offs due to COVID. What I'm trying to understand on the OpEx side, rent, business development, repairs, what are, you know, some of these which you have seen a higher increase as compared to revenues?
Just to give a color of the expenditure, largely our expenditure are coming through operation-related expenditure, employee cost, technology cost and contribution to Investor Protection Fund, which is basically a regulatory cost. Operation-related cost largely covers the inter-KRA that we are required to pay in CVL.
Okay.
That is one of the costs. We also have a cost on the SMS charges that SMS and other alerts that we are supposed to send to the investors. That is one of the major contributor. Rest are our normal contributor. Regulatory cost is a function of the operating profit that we achieve. Higher the operating cost, our contribution towards regulatory cost will also increase because it is directly proportionate to our operating income. It specifies 5% of our operating income has to be contributed to IPF. Roughly, this is the structure of our expenditure.
All right. Can you just share the break-up of larger revenue streams for the quarter?
Sure, I will do that.
Please.
The transaction charge is achieved at INR 52.6 crore-INR 52.77 crore as against INR 30.95 crore. Our online data charge, which is CVL's income, is contributing INR 33.62 crore compared to INR 13.09 crore. I'm giving the comparison of this quarter and December quarter last year.
Yes, absolutely. Year-on-year.
Yeah.
Right.
IPO corporate action income has contributed INR 23.41 crore compared to INR 6.95 crore. Annual issuer charge income is contributing INR 28.98 crore compared to INR 21.69 crore. We have CAS statement charges, which is contributing INR 4.42 crore compared to INR 4.44 crore. Basically this covers almost 88%-98% of our operating income. Rest are, you know, contributing less than 1% or 1%, which is settlement charges, inter-KRA charges, eKYC, CKYC, document storage charges, account maintenance charges. I'm not repeating those things.
Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.
What I told is covering almost 88%-90% of our operating income.
What will be the data provisioning number as on date? Would you have that handy?
We have a provision for the nine months amounting to INR 8 crore compared to INR 7.34 crore during nine months previous year.
In last quarter we had.
It will.
Last quarter we had seen a jump in e-voting. Is that continuing? Do you have that e-voting number?
No, e-voting, see, basically e-voting this year, the extension was not provided. Whatever income that we had recorded till six months, apart from that, we had an income of roughly INR 95 lakhs in this quarter. Majority income has been covered during. As far as companies are concerned, those income has been covered in first two quarters. It is around INR 6.5 crore on nine-month basis. Of which INR 5 crore was already-
Was-
Considered in up to second in the first year.
Yes. Yes. Yes. Absolutely.
Yeah.
Thank you. I'll join back with you. I have some more questions. I'll join back.
Sure. Sure.
Thank you.
Thank you. Participants who wish to ask a question may press star and one on your touch-tone telephone. We have the next question from the line of Devansh Nigotia from SIMPL. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Thanks for the opportunity and, congratulations on good number. Just wanted to know if you can just elaborate on the investor behavior, especially January month when the IPO market was not as active as it was in December quarter and the secondary markets were also weak. When we look at the month-on-month addition of the accounts, they continue to be really robust of around 29-30 lakh absolute addition and 5-5.5% month-on-month growth. If you can just throw some soft points where are these investors heading? Are these for mutual fund investments or for secondary market or IPO markets? Just some direction on the customer behavior if you can just elaborate.
Basically, a Demat account is, say, for mutual fund Demat account is not mandatory, it's optional. Demat account is used for secondary markets. For IPOs it is compulsory. It has multiple end use cases. Therefore, also there have been news in the market about the LIC IPO. People in anticipation also would be kind of wanting to open a Demat account. That's a mandatory thing to do before you can apply in an IPO.
Mm-hmm.
I think it's a culmination of variety of factors that while overall the market has been kind of range bound, but the participation has gone up both in terms of unique client code of the stock exchanges as well as on the Demat accounts getting opened on the depository. I think it's in line with that. We are having more and more participations tier 2, Tier 3 towns, people wanting to, able to, invest in the mainstream market. It will be difficult to point out whether it is IPO driven or it is secondary market driven or mutual fund driven. The mutual fund is not compulsory as of now, it's optional to open a Demat account.
Okay. I mean, directionally that looks like a direction of the adoption that is actually happening.
I'm not talking only about the LIC IPO, also the other PSU IPOs, large other IPOs which are expected to hit the market. People use that. That is one reason. Second is obviously the participation in the secondary market has also gone up. Demat account is a mandatory thing for anybody to participate in the secondary market.
Mm-hmm.
It's a combination of both these factors mainly. Mutual funds, wherever people opt for mutual for the Demat accounts, that also is another contributing factor.
If you can just throw some light on how is this behavior very different from what we have seen historically when there are corrections, participations actually go down, but since you're highlighting in recent months it has actually increased. What do you think has caused this change structurally or it's temporary or?
I think the principal driver has been COVID. Most of the, I think, securities market was continuing on without any kind of disruption. People had their savings which they could access without physically going to their brokers' offices. The online mode, et cetera, this is a digital platform, et cetera, have contributed to this growth. It's kind of an end-to-end process, right from account opening to transactions, initiation of orders to the settlement process, which can be done from the comfort of your home. That's the ease of doing business is kind of encouraging more and more investors, I mean, to come in into the market.
Okay. Thanks a lot, sir. That was really helpful. I'll get back with you.
Thanks.
Thank you. We have the next question from the line of Pranav Mehta from Valuequest. Please go ahead.
Yes, sir. Thanks for the opportunity and congrats on very good results. Firstly, just wanted to dig more, a little bit more deeper in this question on other expenses that somebody else has asked earlier. You know, considering that we are a platform company, we would have thought that you know, as our volumes have grown, our expenses should grow at a much slower pace than our revenue growth. At least in the last couple of years, as our volumes have really grown, our other expenses have also gone up, you know, in sync with our revenue growth. You know, a bit confused as to why there is not enough operating leverage in this line item. If you can just explain a bit more on that front.
Secondly, if you reach back, there was an exchange filing from CDSL that we are divesting our stake in our subsidiary CDSL IFSC Limited. Just wanted to understand our thought process behind that decision. Why would we divest our stake and give up any potential upside that can come through any future developments in that city? These are two of my questions.
Okay. The first question is that while there is an option we are like a financial infrastructure company, and there has to be investment in that technological platforms to ensure that the more sophisticated platforms are put in place. There are also certain regulatory contribution to IPF, sending the SMSs which are connected to the number of transactions happening. That is directly connected with the growth of volumes which has happened. If you see the extent of the income growth is not is higher in terms of percentage, is higher than the growth of the expenses. Because the expenses comprises of both certain fixed costs as well as certain variable costs which are connected directly to the volumes which I have just explained. The second question about the IFSC.
The regulator out there, the IFSC felt that we should not, there should be a single kind of basically a depository. There is basically a group formed to invest into the entire ecosystem of gold and bullion, including basically the depository. That comprises equal stake to CDSL, NSDL, BSE, as well as NSE. Therefore it was felt that rather than having competition. This group should be holding this entire shareholding of this particular thing. They only wanted one single kind of basically depository so that we can compete with the world. It's not that we are going to lose out because now we also have exposure into the stock exchange for basically the gold and the clearing corporation.
As a one fit state we have exposure across the entire kind of ecosystem. Since there is no competition, whatever volume comes will come only to this one kind of entity. That was the reason.
Sure. Thanks a lot.
Thank you. We have the next question from the line of Prayesh Jain from Motilal Oswal. Please go ahead.
Hi, sir. Just a couple of questions. Firstly, do you have anything to quantify in terms of, you know, how many accounts can be opened during, you know, via the LIC IPO with the policyholders? So some understanding if you have. Secondly, can you give some understanding with regards to penetration of Demat account across, you know, major cities and Tier 2, Tier 3 cities? Actually, what is the level of penetration of Demat accounts? You know, where at the country level, we know it's around 5-6%. You know how different it is with regards to Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3 and beyond that cities.
That will be helpful. Thank you. Yeah. I can't hear the first question properly. Could you repeat the first question?
Yeah.
The LIC IPO wherein, you know, we have some separate allocation for policyholders, and, you know, it is expected that a large, quite a few number of Demat accounts will be opened because of that. Yeah. That is a futuristic question. It is difficult for us to assess how many policyholders will actually convert into opening of Demat accounts. We'll have to only wait and watch as if the DRHP gets filed and the issue is launched, but how many actually translate into Demat accounts. I'll not be able to comment on that. Tier 2, Tier 3, we don't give these numbers out into the public domain. It's kind of given as a holistic number which has been done.
I can tell you that there is a general trend that there has been a higher participation also as compared to the previous Tier 2, Tier 3 as compared to the previous year.
Okay. Thank you.
Yeah. Welcome.
Thank you. We have the next question from the line of Mayur Liman from Profitmart Securities. Please go ahead.
Thank you for the opportunity. I just want to
Mr. Liman, your voice is not very clear in the call. Could you come closer to the mic?
Okay. Now it's audible.
Yes, this is clear. Thank you.
Okay. I just want to ask, can you share your thoughts on demand forecast and how do you see quarter four now? That's it from my side.
We don't give any futuristic outlooks, future outlooks. I'm sorry. I will not able to answer that.
Okay. No issues, sir. Thank you so much.
Bye-bye.
Thank you. We have the next question from the line of Pawan Kumar from Shri Ratna Capital. Please go ahead.
Sir, I wanted to just check the IPO income you said for the quarter was around INR 36 crore, right?
IPO, I said, IPO income was INR 23-
charges.
Yeah, yeah.
KYC.
IPO is INR 23.41 crore in this quarter.
KYC charges are INR 36.
INR 33.62 crores.
How much, sir? INR 23.62.
INR 3,333.62 crores.
Okay. If I wanted to split this between, say the fetches versus the near, new charges, what would the split be broadly?
Normally, the fees constitute about 80% of the income.
Okay. Can you just give us an idea of how the charges have varied for the debits maybe on a year-on-year basis?
The fetch is, we charge INR 35 for fetch since inception. That is since 2011. There's no changes since then.
Okay. For the new ones, how has the charges been varied for over the last year-on-year basis?
Basically, we charge INR 20 for a new record.
Okay.
Over the period of time, as the volumes have increased, there have been certain volume discounts given to intermediaries.
Okay. Overall that has come down from INR 3-INR 20, is it?
Sorry?
I didn't get that number clearly, sir. How much was it originally?
Orig-
The new
Our rack rates are INR 20 for new KYC created. Okay? There are volume discounts.
Okay.
given to large players based on the volumes created.
Okay. Okay, sir. Fine, sir. Those were my questions. I'll get back with you.
Thank you. We have the next question from the line of Prakash Kapadia from Anived Portfolio Managers. Please, go ahead.
Yeah. Thanks for the follow-up. You know, we've seen a record, you know, account opening on the Demat side. What I was trying to understand, if I look at the IT return data, there are around 6 crore returns filed, and there are already 8.4 Demat accounts. Is PAN compulsory to open a Demat account or is Aadhaar enough?
No, PAN is compulsory.
PAN is compulsory. As a trend, have we seen, you know, same PAN number opening more incremental accounts? Is that the trend? Or these are, you know, newer Demat accounts which we witnessed over the last year or two?
No. Overall the trend is a newer Demat accounts getting opened, newer people overall.
Okay. You know, recently IT department has automated financial transactions to improve compliance. Is it the depository's responsibility to share data to the IT department? Or is it at the broker end, which, you know, they have to report these transactions?
I think this has nothing to do with the financial performance of the company. This is more of a compliance issue. I think, I don't see the link between the two on this question.
I mean, I was trying to understand, you know, because we've seen a spurt and increase. Government has automated AIS and returns. Does the transaction get reported from our end, or is it, you know, the-
It is all the MIIs have to report.
Okay.
Uh-
Okay. It's entire market participants which
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's what I was trying to get. Lastly, you know, there has been some newer initiative as an accreditation agency. Any sense on the business model or how will it work or the road ahead?
I'll ask Sunil to answer that.
Sure.
Yeah. Basically, we are looking at, you know, a lot of wealth managers getting Indian investors to be registered as accredited investors. We just started sending out feelers to the market. Basically, since we cannot make any forward-looking statements, I mean, we're trying to really figure out how it's going to work out.
Okay. Here, what we'll target guys who are registered as wealth managers or, you know, who are professionals and who can service others. I was just trying to understand the intricacy, not the pricing or.
No, see, we will be working out on a detailed marketing plan, whom to target, et cetera. Right. Sure. I will not be able to-
Sure. Once it's launched.
Discuss out here because it's more a strategy thing for us.
Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. We have the next question from the line of Amit Chandra from HDFC Securities. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Good morning, and thanks for the opportunity. My question is on the revenue that we earn from, you know, a Demat account. Roughly, if I see the revenue for Demat account is around INR 103, INR 105, and that has been declining over the years. In the last two years it has been stable at INR 105 per Demat. Okay. If I see for FY 2022, it has declined to INR 95, you know, per Demat that we are earning. Is it an indication that the people are opening accounts, but the activity for Demat is actually coming down?
That is one thing, if you can throw some light, you know, how do you actually see that trend, you know, like moving and what exactly is causing that? You know, also, you know, secondly, on the exclusivity that we have with the online brokers, so still we are enjoying that kind of exclusivity or are we seeing the other, you know, the competition also catching up and, you know, opening accounts for the online brokers?
On the first question, Amit, it is the overall activity, the delivery-based percentage has gone up significantly. You see, over year-on-year for the last two years on the exchanges, and that has directly got to do with the activity which has been done. So I don't see a reduction in the activity. People may be opening accounts and may not be doing that activity for some of the accounts, so you have taken an absolute number of an average. I think overall, if you see the core delivery percentages, the core margin pledge percentages, and margin pledge is a new line of business. All this has significantly increased, and that's why the quantum has really gone up over the last one or two years. Sorry, what was your second question?
Yeah. Second question was on the exclusivity that we have with the online-
I think that I would not like to comment whether it's exclusive or non-exclusive. The important thing as a company and as a management, we are focused on ensuring the best technology platforms for ease of doing business, and then leave it to the market to figure out which of the platforms is good for them or not good for them. Just take it from there. Our intent is not to have any kind of exclusivity or non-exclusivity. Our important thing and our focus is to give the best product and to ensure that the platforms continue to remain extremely friendly to the final entity, the investor, and then leave it to the market to figure out where they would like to go.
Okay. Now the second question is, you know, what is the pledge income, you know, that we have generated in this quarter? So are we seeing, like increased activity there? Also as you mentioned that, you know, that some part of the other expenses is mostly communication. If you can qualify what is the communication charges, because it has been increasing, you know, steeply because everything has to be, you know, authenticated by SMS. The SMS cost, I think has gone up, you know, like significantly. If you can quantify that.
Yeah. I'll ask the CFO, Girish, to answer that. Can you answer that, Girish?
Mr. Girish Amesara has got disconnected. We are trying to reconnect him back again.
Okay. Can you take on the next question and then he can answer once he is connected?
Okay, Sukant. Hello?
Yeah.
We have Mr. Girish Amesara back online.
Yeah. Hello. Amit, can you repeat your question?
I had heard the question. I will answer his question on the pledge income. In this quarter we have earned a pledge income of INR 4.11 crore. On nine months basis we have earned a pledge income of margin pledge income of INR 10.93 crores.
Okay. Sir on the you know communication charges, how is it, so whether the increase in the other expenses is you know a function of that or the regulatory expenses or the you know. What do you find in that if you can break up that?
Sure. If in absolute value terms, our SMS charges is roughly INR 2.2 crore in the quarter compared to INR 66 lakhs in the previous year same quarter. Yes, the contribution is slightly increased compared to previous year same quarter because our operating income has increased. Our contribution to IPF is around INR 3.84 crore compared to INR 2.20 crore in previous quarter.
Okay, sir. Thank you.
We have the next question from the line of Miraj Shah from Dalal & Broacha Stock Broking Private Limited. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thank you for taking my question. I just have one question, sir. Regarding the annual issuer charges, the revision in annual issuer charges that was supposed to happen, I think, in 2020, which happens every five years. Is there any update on when this will take place, going ahead? Any update on that?
We'll have to see that because that's a joint proposal which is signed by both the depositories to SEBI, and SEBI will approve it. Post-COVID, yet COVID has not completely weathered out. We'll kind of see an opportune time, and then we'll be sending it. We have been in informal talks, but I think that would not be worthwhile talking about at this stage. We'll see at an appropriate time that would do that.
Okay. Any chances that it will be done in this or in the coming financial year?
It will be difficult to answer the futuristic question. We'll have to see, because this is what the SEBI will have to approve, and I cannot really comment on the timelines as to when it will happen.
Okay. Understood. What would be the factor that SEBI would look at while deriving the charges in this?
That will be difficult for me to answer, but SEBI, I cannot second-guess what SEBI will look at. They will look at whatever is the cost and how much increase should be done. It's really difficult to comment on this also.
Okay. Thank you so much for your time.
Welcome.
Thank you. We have the next question from the line of Paresh from Club Millionaire. Please go ahead.
Hi, Nehal Vora. Congratulations to you and your team for the fantastic performance yet again. We pray for your safety and good health. A couple of questions, Nehal Vora. One is on the insurance repository. Will the LIC IPO likely to happen? The regulators earlier mentioning before the pandemic that they would kind of review this process of, you know, having the e-insurance accounts post-pandemic. Any update or any catalyst in terms of kind of gain traction on the insurance e-insurance accounts?
It remains voluntary. Nothing is not yet made mandatory. Okay. Until it is made mandatory, you know, that's the time when the traction will take place.
However, we'll have to wait and watch in terms of how the entire space gets done, or what could be the forward path of IRDA in terms of how they would be taking this forward. As of now, what remains is it is on a voluntary basis.
Okay, fair enough. The similar line on the commodity repository, right? We currently only have I mean, basically only the agri warehousing receipts on electronic mode. Any progress as far as the non-agri is concerned? I mean, again, what would be the catalyst for this to eventually happen? Any talks or progress on that?
There have been certain policy decisions that all warehouses will now have to be basically done with the commodities repository. They have to be basically registered.
I think basically WDRA also is looking at expanding the scope beyond the agri. But that is again futuristic. We'll have to wait and watch as and when it happens. When the agri is also expanded to basically non-agri.
Okay. Finally, this is regarding the National Academic Depository project that we had, right? Which we had to kind of shelve it and which we are trying to kind of start all over again. So how has that been progressing given that, you know, now the pandemic seems to be easing out and schools are basically reopening. Any progress or any update on that as well, Nehal?
Sunil, if you can answer that.
As far as the Academic Depository project was concerned, the MHRD had, you know, appointed DigiLocker after our contract expired.
Sure.
We were offering this service as a private service provider. Because of the pandemic, but most of the universities, et cetera, have been open. For us it has been difficult to add numbers really on that particular product.
Okay. That's it from my side. Thank you all.
Thank you.
Thank you. We have the next question from the line of Aalok Shah from MNCL Group. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks for the opportunity. Congratulations on great set of numbers, Nehal Vora and the team. I had a few questions, you know, more to do with trying to understand. When I look at number of live companies, which is now at close to 70,700, and try and map that to the annual issuer charges, you know, the growth numbers and so-called ratio of income for corporate seems to have gone a bit higher. Is there, I'm reading too much into it, or we are able to get an increased issuer charges?
No, no. The issuer charges is constant, but it depends on the participation and number of folios also. As the participation goes up, the folios also will go up in the overall space of listed companies.
Right.
Accordingly, the issuer charges is connected to that. The charges have not been changed.
Yeah. It's basically the number of folios which are gone up.
Yeah.
Additionally, do the corporates, which are putting into our IPO also, get added into this bucket of 17,748?
Yeah. These are basically the total number. I'll ask the CFO, Girish, to answer that. As per my understanding, this is the total sets, both listed and unlisted.
Yeah. It should be there.
Yes, yes.
Sure. Okay. That's my first question. Girish, I'll quickly check with you. You spoke about cumulative better provisioning at close to INR 8 crore YTD.
Okay.
No, I'm just trying to validate. Is that the right number?
For nine months or for December quarter you said?
I'm okay with anything. Nine months, I think you said INR 80 crores.
Okay. Nine months provision was INR 8.19 crores in the current financial year and INR 7.34 in the previous financial year.
7 point?
347.
Okay.
Seven point three four crores.
Sure. A quick check here. I was trying to understand the standalone numbers. Quarter after quarter, we're seeing significant improvement in the EBITDA margin profile there. This also translates into improvement in margin profile on a consolidated basis. I mean, how do we look at these numbers? Is it that some other subsidiaries are there is still a scope of further ramp up or we need to really look into the subsidiary-wise business only?
No, there is also an operating efficiency angle which I had mentioned earlier in one of the questions. There is certain variable costs. There is also fixed costs. We have seen them on operating efficiency. That cumulatively contributes to the improvement in basically EBITDA margins as we move forward.
Sure. Okay. That's it. Yeah. I'm done with my question.
Mr. Shah, sorry to interrupt. Could you kindly join the queue back again as we have other participants also?
I'm done with my question. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
We have the next question from the line of Mr. Mehul Pathak, who is an individual investor. Please go ahead.
Morning, gentlemen. Congratulations on a good set of numbers. Over the last two, three years, we have started generating, you know, large amount of cash. The company's policy today is to distribute that cash through final dividend at the end of the year. The money comes to us once a year, and that too next year in August, September. Now, if you see good companies, you know, they try to keep only that much amount of cash that generates future growth and keep some amount of contingency funds. Now, what is our driving philosophy in terms of how much cash you should retain? Question number 1. Question number 2, what exactly is the policy in terms of interim dividends?
Three, I have noticed that companies that are growing and distribute dividends and thereby increase their return on capital ratios are generally rewarded by the market a lot better than companies that retain cash and earn single-digit returns. These are my three questions, sir.
First of all, we have a overall dividend policy, about 60% of the operating profits get distributed as dividend. We are a financial infrastructure company, so the strength of basically balance sheet is extremely critical as we take on very large projects also. As the number of Demat accounts grow, there are certain of APB institutions which want to keep. They look at the financial strength of the company. The minimum regulatory capital is basically INR 100 crore. We need to have a significant healthy multiple of that so that the companies will seem to be extremely financially strong to weather any such conditions. That's number one. Number two, there are new asset classes which are coming in which require kind of investment.
Be it the spot goals that SEBI has issued the circular and it should be operationalized. Also, basically the IFSC space where we will be continuing to invest there to increase our number of basically the streams of basically the revenue. Third is, it is also critical. Your third question was the policy on interim dividend. There's no policy on interim dividend. There's a policy on the total dividend. The dividend should be kind of declared at about 60% of the operating profit. The important thing is that we have a set kind of standard operating procedure, so it becomes predictable and a person will be able to kind of assess how much should be the dividend as we go forward.
Once we reach a significant portion of our financial strength balance sheet size, then we will see how better this number needs to be further across, if increase or decrease as the case may be.
Thank you, sir. I'm not entirely convinced with your answer because I think you have more cash than what you need for, you know, all the needs that you have reached.
How would you say? Yeah. Okay. We will take your feedback on the call.
Mr. Pathak, we will move on to the next question as we have other participants also in line.
Sure. Thank you.
We have the next question from the line of Pratik, who is an individual shareholder. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Congratulations team for the set of numbers. I have two questions. The first one is, in this quarter, the other income part was showing some kind of a dip compared to the last quarter. Any reason behind this drop? The second question regarding, if you can throw some light on, like, what are the new revenue streams which might move the top line growth in next couple of quarters?
I'll take the second question first, and I'll ask the CFO, Girish Amesara, to answer the first question. Future revenue stream is something which is, again, a futuristic answer. It will be difficult for me to give you that specific answer. But we are basically in a space where basically the regulator whatever it kind of approves as a product in the securities market and which is linked to basically the project becomes kind of a source of basically revenue. As and when the changes happen in basically the regulations, we'll see how the new revenue streams will come. It'll be difficult for me to give you a specific answer on this. The second question asked. The first question asked, we ask Girish Amesara to answer.
Sure. Basically our other income consists of investment income and other income of, you know, irregular records. Now, in other income, in the last quarter, in September quarter, we had an income which was recorded one-time income around INR 2.5 crore, which is not there in December quarter. With respect to investment income, our investments are largely made in fixed deposits and debt scheme of mutual funds. Basically the reduction which you see on a quarter-to-quarter basis is due to the mark-to-market valuation of mutual fund based on the NAV.
Thank you. As there are no further questions, I would now like to hand over the call to the management for closing comments.
I'd like to wish all of you a very safe and secure time. Take care during these unprecedented times. Thank you all for your questions. Wish you all the very best. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. On behalf of Axis Capital Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your line.
Thank you.