Good evening, a warm welcome to all those who have joined the call. The CSB Bank management will be represented by Mr. Pralay Mondal, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Mr. B.K. Divakara, Executive Director, and Mr. Satish Gundewar, Chief Financial Officer. We specifically thank the management of CSB Bank for giving Yes Securities the opportunity to host their result call. The management will first be making some opening remarks, after which we will throw the floor open for questions. I now invite the management to make their opening remarks. Pralay, over to you.
Thank you, Shivaji, good afternoon, or rather good evening to everybody who's on this call, and thank you for joining our Q1 fiscal year 2027 earnings call. To start with, on the economic scenario, the global economic conditions remain stable despite the surging geopolitical risks in recent weeks. U.S. rates have been stable with probability of rate hikes in this year reducing due to incoming data. India's annual retail inflation rate based on Consumer Price Index rose to an 18-month high of 4.38%, which is still a provisional number, in June 2026. This increase was primarily driven by a rise in Consumer Price Index, CPI, which climbed to 5.32%. This is largely due to supply side effects of increase in oil price. Liquidity situation remains stable and is likely to remain so for the next quarter. Money market and G-Sec rates have softened for this quarter.
Recent escalation in Gulf War did spook the rates. CSB Bank's liquidity remains quite stable. On the CSB specific results, key highlights are on the profitability side. The profit stood at INR 150 crore for Q1 fiscal year 2027, with a 27% year-over-year growth over Q1 fiscal year 2026. Operating profit for the bank grew by 14% on year-over-year basis and stood at INR 251 crore for Q1 fiscal year 2026. Net interest income grew by 26% to INR 479 crore.
The other income decreased by 7%. We'll discuss this when you come on the call, on this point, over Q1 2026, mainly due to decline in treasury profit. Other income excluding treasury profit has grew by 13%. If you ex treasury, we grew by around 13% in Q1 fiscal year 2027. Cost-to-income ratio for Q1 fiscal year 2027 was marginally lower than Q1 fiscal year 2026 and stood around 64.55%.
NIM for Q1 fiscal year 2027 stood at 3.66% against 3.54% for Q1 fiscal year 2026. ROA for the quarter ended June 30, 2026 stood at 1.09% against 1.03% in Q1 fiscal year 2026. Contingency provisions are held intact. The bank is continuing with the accelerated loan provisioning policy, which will aid the bank in transitioning towards the ECL framework. On the liability side, our funding base continued to improve. Deposits recorded a strong year-over-year growth of 26%, significantly outpacing the industry growth rate of 13.4%. CASA ratio stands at 19.41%. To aid liquidity, we also await both domestic and FCY borrowings based on cost considerations.
On the liquidity side, we efficiently managed the liquidity risk. Average LCR for the quarter was 123%, and NSFR ratio was 126%. On the asset side, the advances grew by 24% year-over-year as against industry growth of 18.6%. Yield on advances for Q1 fiscal year 2027 stood at 5%. On the asset quality metrics, the GNPA and NNPA ratios for the quarter stood at 1.75% and 0.39% respectively. PCR stands at 77.96% without PW, almost 78%, which is high compared to what we used to have before. Bank is holding a provisioning buffer of around INR 198 crore, over and above regulatory requirements, including a contingency provision around INR 105 crore.
On the capital side, CRAR continues to be well above the regulatory requirement and stood at 19.96%. Tier 1 ratio stood at 18.96%. Our risk weights are somewhere around 42%, so I think we are very well capitalized given our risk weights. Shareholder value creation. Book value per share stands at INR 289. EPS for Q1 fiscal year 2027 stood at INR 35 against INR 27 for Q1 fiscal year 2026. ROE for the quarter improved from 10.9% in Q1 fiscal year 2026 to 12.71% in Q1 fiscal year 2027.
On the distribution side, we have a network of 868 branches and 835 ATMs as on June 30, 2026. In conclusion, I'd like to say that the quarter witnessed healthy growth across our key business parameters, especially when you look at year-on-year. We are a very seasonal bank. It's not just one year. Every year, we'll see that Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4 operates differently for us. From that seasonality perspective, we have done well on our year-on-year basis. Our deposits and advances grew by 26% and 24% year-on-year respectively, significantly outperforming the average industry growth trends. Importantly, in contrast to the broader industry parameters, deposit growth outpaced advances growth, resulting in a favorable improvement in our credit deposit ratio, which is now below 90%. Just marginally below 90%. We further tapped the funding streams optimally, leading to a comfortable liquidity position and room for growth.
I don't see liquidity as a risk for us at all in the coming year, depending on the growth plans we have. On the advances front, the corporate and gold portfolio continue to perform well. Amidst the market uncertainties, we remain measured in our approach towards the SME/BL, as we call it, and other unsecured retail book consistent with the cyber risk appetite, and will resume scale once the environment turns conducive. Our lending strategy continues to be guided by a balanced focus on profitability, asset quality, and sustainable long-term growth. On the liability side, we are enhancing our sales capabilities deepening our distribution reach and driving return alignment towards customer acquisition channels. These efforts are expected to drive stronger customer engagement, improve conversion rates, and further strengthen our ability to generate granular and sustainable deposit growth. From a profitability perspective, our operating performance remained resilient.
Operating profit increased by 14%, while net profit registers a growth of 27% over the corresponding period last year. Looking ahead, our objective is not merely to grow, but to grow efficiently by improving operating leverage, increasing employee productivity, deepening customer engagement, and accelerating the payback from our technology transformation initiatives. We remain firmly committed to delivering SBS 2030 milestones in a progressive and disciplined manner quarter-on-quarter. Just to end my initial comments, I'd say that the entire technology transformation went on extremely well. Now we are going to leverage that, and that's the reason we have just started our retail liability acquisition channel, because now we can launch whichever products we want to. Even on the transaction banking side, our trade, our supply chain, and CMS, all systems, some are already in place, some will be in place in the next three to four months.
We are looking at enhancing our transaction banking ability and products and services there. We will continue to leverage and build the franchise, and now the journey really begins for the health phase in true earnest in terms of scaling the bank with respect to new customer acquisition, a more balanced growth across segments, and the franchise creation. With that, I stop. Over to you for questions. Thank you very much.
Thank you so much, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin with the question- and- answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may click on the raise hand icon from the participants tab on your screen. We request participants to restrict to two questions each and then return to the queue for more questions. To rejoin the queue, you may click on the raise hand icon again.
We will wait for a few minutes until the question queue assembles. Requesting participants to click on the raise hand icon. All participants who wish to ask a question may click on the raise hand icon that we have on the bottom of the page. We will wait for a few minutes until the question queue assembles. We will take our first question from Puneet Balani of Dolat Capital. Puneet, please go ahead with your question. Puneet, we are unable to hear you. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Just from the two things first. Firstly, with your gold portfolio is now 54%, the way you reclassified of the total portfolio. Growth, because post the new regulations and everything, some peers have highlighted that they face some struggles with growth. What are we thinking on that? Are we going to continue to grow gold or there are other sources of growth which we are eyeing? Accordingly, what is the growth guidance thereof? Secondly, sir, our bulk deposit mix is over 52% of term deposits, and it is around 40% of total deposits. This is something which is inherently volatile and creates pressure on your funding cost also, which I believe is the reason for lower NIMs. Any comment on that, sir? What is the target here? Because that is something I believe is causing a lot of pressure on margins, if I am not wrong.
Thanks, Puneet, for your question. First of all, yes, gold is somewhere around 54%, but we have continued to grow gold at a reasonable pace. Right now, the two businesses, which are not only in terms of mix one of the highest, one is gold and one is wholesale. These are the two portfolio has grown also. To that extent, it has not been so challenging. Strategically, we want to ensure that we become a holistic bank, just not a golden bank, which has been an objective for our SBS 2030, hence, eventually this 54% will have a glide path internally going towards somewhere around 30% by 2030, hence other businesses has to grow.
On your question on regulation, et cetera, one thing which happened is, on the replacer business, though we could have done it till past April this year, we had to taken a call, renew whatever we are doing. That's why that portfolio came down from INR 2,100 odd crores to around now INR 60 crores. Effectively, it's gone. It will also run off by next quarter. That was not under golden, that is under retail, that's one of the reasons we call it last. That's one of the reasons we are seeing that the gold disbursements, sorry, retail disbursements as well as retail portfolio has big grown. Primary reason is that we have kind of a run of that INR 2,000 crore portfolio on a small retail portfolio.
Overall, I think that directionally, we will continue to have gold loans somewhere around 50% this year, then gradually taking a glide path over the next three to four years, closer towards 30%, primarily because of growth of other businesses will go up. Otherwise, most of the regulations we have sort of implemented and there are positives and challenges both. Positives are now renewals are allowed, hence, operationally this becomes a little easier. Of course, there are challenges in terms of induced monitoring and things like that where we have put and we are continuing to putting more and more processes in place. On your question on deposit mix, yes, bulk is around 52% right now and retail is around 48%. That's the reason, no rocket science, that our cost of funds is slightly higher. This is done to fund building a long-term franchise.
Eventually, as and when the CASA franchise starts building, as and when the granular retail is a function of the CASA franchise that starts building, I have already told that will start happening by fiscal year 2028 onwards, because we just launched our systems last year. Products are being built, sales team is in getting in place. It's a kind of a high road which we have to take and build that franchise. Today, we are ready to build that franchise. We have the machines to build that franchise, the teams to build that franchise. Till then, we cannot wait for that to build the asset side of the business or the balance sheet. That's why we are funding it to a slightly higher cost. Our cost of fund is somewhere around 3.5%, sorry, 6.5%, that's the reason.
Volatility, as I said before, funding is not a problem. Volatility is not a problem at all for us, because as you saw that LCR is 123. The reason we don't take it further up is because everything taking further up with these kind of funds is inefficient for the bank. Why is it not volatile? Because when we do bulk, primarily we do non-callable, the clear tenor in place so that it is well planned. We also have funding in form of FCY, in form of CDs, in form of refinance. Of course, CASA and retail deposits and bulk deposits and wholesale deposits are all in place. Given the size of our balance sheet, which is reasonably small, managing this is not a problem at all. Funding volatility and risk is absolutely not there in the bank.
Yes, cost of funds is slightly high because we primarily focus on non-callable deposits.
Got it. Firstly, the NIM decline is only because of the bulk deposit mix increase, right? Is that a fair assumption to make mostly?
Yes.
Most of the-
When I see the breakup of where my higher cost is, one is bulk deposit.
one is FCY, and one is CDs. Now.
Got it.
All this, as and when the overall stabilization happens, will repress itself faster than the retail deposits. Okay?
I'm not kind of saying that we should replace or do bulk and CDs because of that reason, we must do retail. Given where we are, purely from a financial perspective, as and when the yield curve improves, CD, for example, if there is really a lot of FCNR deposits comes to the, FCNRB comes to the country, liquidity will improve. When it improves, hopefully CD prices probably would show some softening. All that will help us both in bulk and CDs in the near future. Long-term, we have no choice but to build retail deposits because that's the only way our franchise will build. Tactically, we're okay, but strategically, we have to build the retail. Yes, you are right.
At this point of time, what had also happened, because while all the numbers I read out are looking good because they are at year-on-year, but you may have questions quarter-on-quarter. The answer to that is that some of the deposits which we brought in March end of 2026, they didn't have costs in Q4, but their cost all came in Q1. That's the reason this is a flow-through which is happening. As we are talking, we are not seeing deposit prices elevating anymore. If at all, there's a marginal softening which is happening. As a net replaces, hopefully things will start getting better on the NIM side. The other reason, which is a fluctuating number, is also NIM to some extent gets impacted with your slippages and things like that.
For us, we had little bit of a funny story where Q3 had high slippage. Q4, we had a lot of upgrades and recovery. Again, in Q1, there's a little bit of a slippage. That also impacts slightly in the overall NIM. Overall, I think, like last year also in the first quarter, I had said this is the worst case scenario. This year also, this NIM is the worst case scenario. We'll only improve from here.
Got it. Just structurally on the mix, because you're saying the products are in place and it will take time. Say, the mix decline should be visible maybe from next year onwards, or how should we see that trajectory going forward for the mix?
This year we will see gold coming to somewhere around 50%. We are around 50%.
Okay. I was referring to the deposit mix, sorry. The bulk deposit.
Deposits.
Yeah.
Deposits. That is going to take little time, because we also have to see that building our retail franchise, when we have just launched products, will be first the CASA we have to get in, and then we have to get in the retail deposits. You will start seeing, and this is not the first time I am saying, I have said before also, you will start seeing that. The plan is that CASA will grow as much as the deposits only in fiscal year 2028 onwards, fiscal year 2029 onwards, CASA will do better than deposits, and hence, that's the time we will see a improvement in CASA ratio.
This year, we will be lucky if we continue to hold the same CASA ratio, because if you have to grow by 25% minimum, and if our CASA, then also we have to grow by 25%, we have to see if we can do it or not. We are trying, we are putting our sales machinery in place, so if we do a good job, I think our CASA ratio will remain the same.
Right. On the yield front, your yield on gold loan has declined, or also on the BLG book, the yield has declined. What is the reason for that, just on a quarter-on-quarter basis? Is this something just a seasonality, this thing, or maybe there is something else to it?
On gold loan, yield has not really declined too much. It has come down from 12% something to 11.81% or something like that. Those things can happen a little bit here and there. There is no specific reason because we didn't decrease the gold yields. It could be just a mix of some products, businesses, et cetera. It went down from Where is gold? 12.85%.
15 basis points.
15 basis points, that's what I said.
Right.
On the SME or BLG side, it went down from 9.81%- 9.25%. One of the reasons for this is that SME, given the environment, and given the size and geography we operate, we are just being little more cautious and careful, because who knows whether tariff is coming back again or not? Who knows what is happening, the worst share prices? With all the supply chain challenges, et cetera, we are just being a little careful. That's why our credit standards, we have raised the bar on the SME side a little bit right now. This can change again once the disruption starts taking over, but at least for this year, we have decided we'll be careful on SME. Because we had some slippages in SME this quarter, which we know that it will come back.
We'll have the same Q3, Q4 story of last year, where some slippage has happened in Q3 and Q4, again, it got upgraded. Similar thing will happen this year also, either in Q2 or Q3, it will get upgraded. We are fairly confident of that. Given that, there has been some impact on the yields on the SME. It's a function of both. Incremental businesses are getting booked at slightly lower yields because we are taking much lesser risk. Secondly, some slippages, which is only a transient kind of a slippage, has impacted, and hence it should get better next quarter on that margin.
Got it. ECLS, how much have-
I'm really sorry, Puneet. Would you mind-
Sorry
Coming back in the queue?
Sure
A few other participants.
Yeah.
Thank you. Thank you so much, Puneet. We'll take our next question now from Parag Jariwala of White Oak. Parag, please go ahead.
Yeah. Pralay, can you hear me?
Yeah.
Yes.
Yeah. Hi. My first question is, I got the explanation which you have given to the previous question about the yield and margins. If I just look at the quarter-over-quarter movement in the loan portfolio, your gold SME and retail has been declining, and I got a detailed reply of INR 2,000 crore, which you have given there. Even if I look at gold and SME, they've grown at around 2 odd-ish % put together. Most of the growth has come in from the corporate side, which is around 6% quarter-over-quarter. Pralay, what I want to ask you is that, since we are bulk deposit dependent to an extent, because such kind of Ideally, we have borrowed in a wholesale and given a corporate loan rate. Wouldn't this kind of create a pressure on the margins?
If yes, we can give up this kind of a business, and maintain the profitability. What were your thought process there? That is the first question I have.
Yeah.
Second is on the asset quality. How should we think about slippages and upgradation? It has been quite volatile because in first quarter, we saw around INR 140 odd crore, first quarter last year. We kind of recovered a bit in second quarter, in third quarter, we saw around INR 200 crore. We recovered a bit in fourth quarter. This quarter also, as you mentioned, there are some slippages on the SME side. The reason I'm asking, this is not stabilizing and remains quite volatile and difficult to predict, and difficult to gauge what's happening there. If you can give some comfort on that side, that would also be helpful. Yeah, these are my two questions. Thank you.
Absolutely, Parag. Thank you. On your first question, it's pretty clear your question is that can you fund a wholesale asset book with wholesale funding? That's the question.
Yeah.
The answer to that is that, as long as we can keep the NIM within our guidelines, which is somewhere around 3.75% is our guideline, somewhere around that.
We can be little lower at some times, and we can be little higher at times, but for the whole year, our guideline is 3.75%.
As long as we can manage our ROA somewhere around 1.2%-1.5%. Now I know we are lower than that this quarter, but we'll make it up there for sure, because the same thing we did it last year as well.
That's how our trajectory of the bank is for the last few years.
By doing this, what we are creating is, we are creating a wholesale franchise because here we are not doing tactical business in wholesale. The way the teams have been built, the way the structures have been built-
in terms of large corporates, commercial banking/mid corporates-
financial markets. We are diversifiscal yearing the risk by saying that now financial markets have come down around 1/3 of the whole portfolio. There is a period of time when it's true, 70% of the portfolio. All that we are doing it by distributing the risk and building the future franchise. We are in the franchise building mode on the corporate side. Given that, very clearly the target to Manish Modi, who's our Head of Wholesale, is that eventually he has to deliver both ROA as well as ROIC. ROIC by itself doesn't mean everything.
A combination of ROA and ROIC will help us in building a good quality. That can only happen when the transaction banking. If you look at it, the amount of investments, both in terms of people and in terms of technology which we're putting in transaction banking, is primarily derive this ROA and ROIC from the wholesale banking relationships.
One thing I don't know whether we have disclosed or not, last year in our growth, there has been significant contribution on the liability side from wholesale side as well.
Okay.
That's one thing. Their cost of funds is in line with retail cost of funds. Maybe it comes here and there. Given that is a fast indication that we are building just not opportunistic asset book, because it has no meaning. I completely agree with you, it has no meaning. When you are building a franchise, when we are starting with liability, we are starting to build non-funded business, that has also grown well. When you are starting to build a transaction banking franchise, our products at least to start with, and capability, then we are building a proper wholesale franchise, and there are investments to be made. If at all, in retail, we have to make investments in manpower, operating cost and all that.
In wholesale, we have to make investment in terms of little compressed NIM for that franchise for some time, as long as they're able to, in the long term, deliver ROA. That's the thought process behind building the wholesale bank.
We will be able to manage this till the time our gold mix is somewhere between 45%-50% or so.
We have calibrated it in our mind very clearly. As and when the gold mix starts coming below 45%, then each of these businesses has to stand on their own feet. Then we will start monitoring. We already monitor. I'm saying that we'll start demanding the ROA from each of these respective business, and that kind of a time is given to every business to build their franchise.
That's the thought process on the wholesale side. On the headline item, I'm saying again that, so far I don't see a risk to our guidance on the NIM on a full year basis of 1.3%-1.75%. I don't see too much of a risk on our ROA guidance of 1.3%-1.5%, in that range. I don't see much. As long as we can do that and then build a franchise on the wholesale side, and then eventually build a franchise on the retail side for which the systems are now in place. Huge investments have gone into technology in the last, one or two years, and now we have to fructify year and leverage that investment into building a franchise leading to a better ROA in future. We are on the right path.
We got delayed on the technology for some time. I have discussed with you why, how, et cetera.
Yeah.
Now we are firmly on track. That's your first question.
The second question was?
About the asset quality.
Asset quality fluctuations. What has happened is this quarter we had a slippage of around INR 90 crores, I don't exactly remember the number, INR 96 crores or something like that. Last quarter, was around INR 60 crores something.
This INR 96 crore is much lower than what it was in Q3 of-
Yeah
That's the point you're making, that how do we make it out? This is happening because the portfolio is small. This is not happening in wholesale, by the way.
This is, to some extent, happening in BLG or SME to some extent. That's the reason we have turned cautious a little bit because the environment we deal in BLG. The good part is, a lot of this is not moving into eventual losses because we don't do any unsecured business.
That's the reason, the fluctuation because we had a slippage in Q3 and we had an upgrade of some INR 80 crores or something like that in Q4. Okay. Again, I'm saying whatever slippages we have seen in BLG this quarter, some fair bit of this will come back in Q2 only and some part will come in the Q3 back. Because these are not bad businesses. These are well collateralized, and hence, they are going through a cycle because of various issues in the ecosystem. We don't manage our books, we just try to say that whatever happens, No unsecured loan in BLG.
Hence, we are able to upgrade those customers as and when this happens. You will see, I mean, in Q2 and Q3 we'll see things have changed again. Yes, there has been a little bit of volatility, and it has never happened before. This year is happening, primarily because of, I think it's because of the environmental challenge. You can say that other banks are not facing it, I don't know. Maybe in the markets we are seeing a cash flow issue or supply chain issue or some demand issues there for those customers. Hence, we are doing what we have to do. Eventually, these are not going into losses.
Sure. Sorry, just one question, if I can chip in. This year, sorry, this quarter, we are somewhere near to 1% kind of an ROA. This 1.3%-1.5%, should we consider that as more normalized in the long term, which can be achieved in 2028/2029? Or you think in 2027 also you would be-
No, no, in 2027 itself we'll touch 1.3%. Okay?
Okay.
If you look at last year's trajectory, also a similar trajectory. There is no reason for me to believe that we can't do it this year, because I think we are better placed this year. A more balanced kind of a franchise with all, not all, but more cylinders firing. Okay? I don't see a risk for 1.3% ROA. To be conservative. Don't see too much into this quarter's ROA, because last quarter, ROA in the same quarter is even lower than this.
Yeah. No, get it. Sure. Thank you and all the best.
Thank you, Parag. Thank you.
Parag, do you have any more questions?
No, I'm done. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you. We'll take our next question from Somil Shah of Paras Investments. Somil, please unmute your microphone and go ahead, please.
Am I audible?
Yes.
Okay. I wanted to know why other income has gone down considerably in this quarter.
Yeah. It has always been a strong point for us, other income. There are three reasons, because last year, do we disclose treasury income separately?
Yes.
You and investors, yes. Whatever. Without giving numbers, let me tell you that last year, Q1, we had a substantial treasury gain in Q1, and this year we have almost negligible treasury gain in Q1. We must have disclosed these numbers last year. This is the investor point, see. We had INR 53 crores of treasury gain last year in Q1, and this year we have got INR 3 crores, I think, treasury gain this year. Okay? From that perspective, it is obvious. Second is that on insurance, because of various noise in the system, et cetera, and there are various things which we read, and we also know that, RBI governor himself is looking into complaints of customers and things like that.
We took a step back on our insurance and we put a lot of things in place so that we are. Hence, in CPGRAMS, for example, which is the GIFS, we got six out of eight times, five or six out of eight times, we have got the best service compliance management award. We are proactively taking these actions so that we are not on the wrong sides of this misselling and compliance, et cetera. Our board is very firmly focused on that. We put several measures. Because of that, the insurance business actually did lesser than what we did last year same quarter. That's only a corrective measure. Now it will start picking up, because now that things have stabilized, what we have taken measures.
We took fairly tough measures on that to ensure there are no probable misselling in the branches of the banks. These are the two main reasons why our fee income has sort of come down. There's a third reason, which is if you look at the disbursement numbers, which we shared with you, the gold loan side as well as the loan against share gold loan, which is the LAS. In both places, because that we don't show separately, but in retail, you see disbursement have significantly come down. What has come down in disbursement in retail is primarily LAS, which is against gold. In normal gold business also, disbursement has come down year-on-year slightly and quarter-on-quarter significantly. With disbursement, processing fee comes down.
Because we are undergoing a lot of regulatory and other things, et cetera, in the gold loan business, for example, induced monitoring, other things, et cetera. Any transition takes little time. It will pick up again next quarter onwards. This quarter we have been very cautious and careful. That's why the disbursements has been little low on gold and gold-related retail products. These are the three reasons why processing fee, insurance fee, and treasury, which we have no hand in it, but it happens naturally based on cycles. All three. That's why our overall fee has come down to around 12%-13% of overall income, where our guidance will be somewhere around 16%-17% or so. We have lost around 5% primarily, but most of it will come back because at some point of time treasury will also make money, hopefully, in the year.
Core fees also, we'll make some money on insurance because Q2 onwards we'll see the insurance pick up and gold disbursement also will start picking up. Between all these three, I think fee income around 15%-16% will be there. For the full year, we'll try to come back to around 17%.
Mm-hmm. On the treasury, sir, why there was so much of fluctuation? Last Q1 you said INR 3 crores, and now it is INR 53 crores. I mean, INR 53 crores to INR 3 crores.
Because this year we didn't book any profits because it's a question of a call that do we want to make profits when yields have gone down marginally, or you want to keep it for future, is a call which you have to take. We took a little conservative call and said that we are not rushed for this, so let's wait because we have a much larger AFS book than the HTM book at this point of time. Because that one opportunity we got, we put a lot of money in the AFS.
We have ability to book that profit as and when situation stabilizes. No rush. If it happens this year, fine. If it doesn't happen this year, the bank will look at next year. No point making small profits and feeling good about it. That's the reason. Last year we had a opportunity to make large profit, and then we banked that and made that profit that year. That's a kind of a call which we took.
Okay. On the ROA front, if I'm not wrong, earlier calls, we were saying that we should be closer to 1.5 ROA for fiscal year 2027. Now I think I heard to the previous participant you said around 1.3. Are we revising our guidance or?
No, I said that we are between one, because Parag was asking me that ROA is at 1.03%, 1.0%, somewhere around that. Will you take it to 1.3%? That's what I was responding. Our internal objective is still ROA of 1.5%. That is internal target. I'm saying that we'll not go below 1.3% for this year under any circumstances. That's the point. It was a different response to a different question.
Okay. From here to reach an 1.5% ROA for a full year basis, I think gradually we need to inch. By Q4, we need to exceed 1.5%, only the average comes below. Yeah.
Of course. Of course, I understand that, yes.
Okay. We see no issues with that as of now.
No. I said we will be between 1.3%- 1.5%.
Sir, just one question on our promoter entity, if I may ask. Our promoter entity, Fairfax, has been emerged as a frontrunner for IDBI Bank stake sale. Just wanted to know, what is the management thought process on this? Will we be running as an independent bank? Or if you could give some sense on this, what happens to CSB Bank post this acquisition?
First of all, this is something which Fairfax has to answer, not me.
CSB has never got into any conversation, negotiation, discussion on this point. Having said that, I have asked this question to Fairfax, they have said, "Please continue your business as usual. Nothing changes for you." We will continue to do what we are doing as usual. For example, when you are doing a tech transformation, this conversation, by the way, is going on for the last five, six years, with Fairfax.
Right.
Just a simple thing. We asked them that at that point of time also, when we were doing the tech transformation, that IDBI is Infosys, so should we take Infosys or Oracle? Finally, we took Oracle. Okay? Fairfax has left the decision to the management to decide how to run the bank. Okay? We are not on the deal street. We are business guys, so we know how to run business. We have been told to run business. That's all I know.
Okay. Thanks for your detailed answers. That's it from my side. Thank you, and all the best.
Thank you so much, Somil.
Thank you, Somil. We have [Vibhor Talreja] of [Nest Amplifier] . [Vibhor] , please unmute your microphone and go ahead with your question.
Hi, am I audible?
Yes, [Vibhor].
Yeah. Hey. Hi, Pralay. Hope all well. Congratulations for completing six years.
Thank you.
Pralay, look, the question is not based on quarterly, but more on a long-term. The idea was some of us have invested behind you when you joined Catholic Syrian Bank, but at the end of six years, when I see there has been a growth on the gold loan side, and there it's partly a lot due to the significant increase in gold loan prices. Whether it is the retail assets or retail liabilities, nothing much really happened in a larger six years time period, at least in line with the expectations or the initial guidance. I hear you that you wanted to first build the retail liabilities, even the wholesale book still continues, the retail assets did not grow.
Even now, at least the feel I am getting is that this is going to be a very slow grind, while we have invested in technology over the last two years, which got a bit delayed. If you can, I'm sure as management, we have been at it, and every time we speak, there is a massive clarity of how we are doing things. It would be good to understand, where the focus has been and what changes. As a shareholder, it has been a fairly longer period, and not much visible except the continued good growth in gold loan, along with good asset quality, and so on and so forth. Beyond that, from numbers output, it is not visible. I'm sure a lot more has gone into it, would like to understand from you, how should we think about it?
Thanks, [Vibhor] , for your question. It's a very important and strategic question, let me try to respond suitably. Let me take a step back and say what we said. Okay? When we looked at the whole thing, we created a vision of SBS 2030. We clearly defined the period and said that we'll sustain what is good in the bank. On the business side, one of the things which was very good is understanding of the gold loan business. Okay? We have continued to sustain that, and sustain is a continuous variable. Just doing gold loan, you need an NBFC, you don't need a bank. We said that, how do we build a bank? We said that we have to build a bank. Next stage, once you have stabilized and sustained the bank, is to build the bank. Okay?
When we were building the bank, we decided we'll have five pillars: governance, human capital, technology, customer service, and compliance. When you look at these five pillars, how we have fared on them. On governance, we have done extremely well. On compliance, we have done extremely well. Okay? On human capital, we have done extremely well in terms of the quality of leadership across all verticals. The culture which we have built, which is a part of the second pillar, we have done extremely well. Technology is delayed because of some specific reason, which I've discussed one-on-one with various large investors. It got delayed because of some decisions got delayed, eventually, when it was decided, we did it at a breakneck speed with 52 surround system, another eight surround system within the CBS, with transaction banking, with ServiceNow, with everything together.
We have to understand that bank didn't have much of a technology platform, data centers. Everything was for a very small niche kind of an organization. We had to break and rebuild everything. Banks do take time to build a long-term franchise. Just doing business retail assets, I know how to do retail assets business, appointing people, and getting business done. That's the NBFC model, that's not what we wanted to do. Given that, look at the execution part, that once we got our kind of approval to go ahead with the technology part and the thing is implemented in quickest time possible. We said that scale phase will start from fiscal year 2027 to fiscal year 2030. While I'm giving these reasons what was decided, and broadly, except for the technology got delayed by two years, 2.5 Years.
That too was a decision point, was not a execution point. Almost everything else we achieved the way I had told we had given guidance to the markets. While we are here, let's not also miss the point that almost every year we have delivered. Okay. Sometimes you deliver as a franchise, sometimes you deliver tactically. What you're saying is absolutely correct, that so far we have played a tactical game to build a long-term franchise. Tactical game is not to just pass one year and next year again build the tactics. The whole strategy play has remained over the listing, and it is only going to strengthen in the next three, four years, and you will see results.
The tactical play is that if we cannot fund this, because we're a listed bank, I cannot say that, "Wait, give me three years, I'll build it, and then we'll do it." Every quarter I have to perform, and one quarter, one ROI going down by 10 basis points, 20 basis points, rightfully I'll be questioned. Okay. Given that, I have to have a tactical play to ensure we manage cost, we manage NIM. Many parameters has to be managed. In between, funding challenges came because we are not a great class of franchise. All that we have navigated in difficult periods, and almost every quarter, every year, we have delivered a reasonable profit and reasonable growth on the balance sheet side. We focus more on balance sheet growth.
I had no reason to say that we get somebody like Manish and his team and build a wholesale franchise if we are not building a long-term good quality bank. Okay. That's the reason. Retail, the only thing is I have done retail all my life. I know too well when to press the pedal, because if you press the pedal too fast, you'll meet an accident, especially in my environment like this. I chose not to go to DSA, not to go to partnerships, not to create digital partnerships and all this, because in the end, in my view, this can lead to challenges if it is not completely owned and managed by us. We're doing the traditional way, that build the machine first, then build the customers, build the franchise, then cross-sell, then build retail, because then that becomes sustainable compounding growth story.
Hence, by 2030, still we have fiscal year 2027, fiscal year 2028, fiscal year 2029, fiscal year 2030. I've always said that last four years, last three to four years is the most critical. Why? Because on a larger base, we'll show the growth. That will not be relevant on a smaller base, what we did, how we did it. I think we are firmly on track on the execution story. Yes, we are only one place we fell short, which is taking the decision on the technology, which got delayed by 2.5 Years. Other than that, we have executed everything. While we have delivered every quarter and every quarter we can't deliver, but every year we have reasonably delivered on the top line, and most of the key ratios has been sustained within reasonable guidance. That's all I can say.
Rest is we have to wait and watch how the execution happens.
[Vibhor] , do you have any more questions now?
I think he's dropped out. No, he's there. Yeah.
No, I'm here. I said thank you and all the very best, sir.
Oh, we couldn't hear it. Sorry. Sorry, [Vibhor] . Thank you very much.
My apologies.
Yeah.
Thank you so much, [Vibhor] . We have our next question coming in from Jeevananth Manivasagam. He is an individual investor. I think he is no longer raising his hand. We will go with Piyush Singh of CT Family. Piyush.
Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Am I audible?
Yes, please.
My question was in the lines that, I think a couple of quarters back, I think you've already answered on return ratios, but we still stick to our Lakshman Rekha 15% of ROE that we've mentioned a lot of times last year.
Piyush, your question. You have any other questions or this is it?
This was like I think mostly this question, I think others have already asked.
Okay. Thank you. Piyush, broadly, last year we started with 10% ROA and we ended somewhere around 14%, I think. 14.26% or something like that, if my memory serves me correct. This year we have started with slightly around 12%. As you see that I'm saying the trajectory will be moving up, ROE trajectory will move up. We would like to see ourselves ending the year slightly better than last year. Last year, we ended at 14.2% or something like that. This year, we'll try to touch the Lakshman Rekha if we can execute it right.
Got it. That was the only question. Thanks.
Thank you, Piyush. We have our previous individual investor, Jeevananth Manivasagam. Jeevananth, would you like to go ahead and ask your question now?
Hello.
Yes.
Am I audible, sir?
Yes.
Yes.
Please go ahead.
Yes.
Yes, sir. Good evening, sir. May I know the reason why there is a drastic fall in disbursement this quarter? Is there a conscious call or anything specific, sir?
So this-
Disbursement.
This I explained, sir, in the beginning.
Right.
I'll just quickly repeat it. Disbursement has gone up in wholesale. Disbursement has remained similar in our SME business. Only two businesses where disbursement has gone down, and both are linked to gold. In retail, where disbursement has gone down primarily is something called loan against security product, where the collateral is gold. This is the replacer business, which RBI effectively said from April 1st, fiscal year 2027, this business cannot be done. Because this guidance was given some time back, we had started a reduction on this business, and hence that is showing up now in this quarter. That portfolio, which used to be 2,100+ portfolio, has now become INR 60 crores. Effectively it will get zeroized. That is how the retail disbursement has gone down. The reason the gold disbursement has gone down is that there are two, three reasons.
One is that there are a lot of regulatory implementations we had to do this quarter. To give you one or two examples, there are many, but I'm just giving one or two. How do you do end-use monitoring? How do you document? There are a lot of inputs and guidances which came, and we are busy implementing those on the ground. Some of these things takes time. Now we are ready with it more or less, things are going to smoothen out a little bit more. That is one of the reasons. The second reason also is, obviously, when gold loan prices don't go up anymore and it starts coming down, some of the top ups or some of the customers, what they do is they close the loan and take a higher loan, and that is taken as a disbursement.
It is never possible that if you look at last quarter, our gold loan book was somewhere around INR 21,000 crore, and disbursement was
INR 16,000 crore.
INR 14,000-INR 15,000 crore or something.
INR 16,000 crore.
INR 16,000 crore last quarter. 16,000 crore of disbursement cannot lead to a book of INR 21,000 crore. Obviously, a lot of those renewals or top-ups happens with a slightly higher value, and hence they close and open those loans again with a slightly higher value. When the price starts coming down, they don't have motivation to do that. That's why they are not shown as a disbursement. That does not mean that the portfolio is coming down. It's just that the portfolio remains where it is. If the price had gone up, then what you'd have done is suppose you had INR 100 of gold loan, you would have taken out that gold loan and booked it at INR 120, and INR 120 would have shown the disbursement. That 100 will remain as portfolio in the system. That's another technical reasons why this has happened.
As gold price starts going up, you will see disbursements going up again. Disbursements going up do not necessarily build the portfolio by the value of the disbursement. It only takes the value up by the incremental quantity of the disbursement. This is why, processing fee is on the total disbursement, and when customer is getting a higher loan, he doesn't mind paying a processing fee on the whole amount. That's one of the reasons why I said our processing fee has been a little down this quarter, primarily because of this disbursement on the gold loan and insurance and treasury income. All three, I said. These are transient, and I'm very confident that through the year, things will start getting better on this one, both on regulatory implementation, execution capability, and hopefully the cycle.
Jeevananth, do you have any follow-up or Jeevananth, can you hear us?
He's on mute, actually.
Yes. Jeevananth, can you unmute your microphone? Do you have any follow-up question?
Yes, sir, I have one more question. Right now, our share of unsecured loan in the overall AUM is around 2%. Is there any plan to increase it further, sir?
Sir, you are very right that right now our overall bank's unsecured retail of overall bank's book is only 2%. This includes personal loan, credit cards, and other unsecured loans. We obviously understand that yields are much higher in unsecured business than a secured business. Right now, we are managing risk because our liability franchise, customer additions, et cetera, we are starting to work on that. The day we have that franchise in place, then we will go all out on our unsecured business. That is still a year away, at least a year away. Given that, we'll still remain little risk-averse, and also there is still, I don't think the cycle is fully over on the unsecured side of the business. Especially, we are hearing challenges on jobs, some of the sectors having issues because of the AI and other things, et cetera.
A lot of the people who takes these personal loans and unsecured loans and all these are in some of the sectors. A player who's already firmly placed in that segment will continue to do well, but no point entering a zone which is little bit challenging at this point of time, especially because our liability franchise is still growing. Given that, we have said that unsecured business is something we'll start focusing on only fiscal year 2028 onwards, not in fiscal year 2027.
Okay, sir. Thank you, sir. That's all from my side. Thank you.
Thank you, sir. Thank you.
Thank you so much. Requesting participants, if you wish to ask any questions, please click on the Raise Hand icon that you see on the Participants tab on your screen, at the bottom of the screen. We'll take a follow-up question right now from Puneet Balani of Dolat. Puneet, would you like to go ahead? We cannot hear you, Puneet.
Like as going corporate and a bit, often gold loan are growth guidance of 20+% is intact or 25%. What would that be? Second thing, how much have we done in ECLGS? Sanctions and disbursements? Yeah.
On your first question, because there's a voice issue, I could not fully understand, let me guess the question. Right now, wholesale business is somewhere around 24% or so of the book. We want to take it to around 32% by fiscal year 2030, and gold loan, which is somewhere around 54%, will also reach the similar level by fiscal year 2030. Wholesale and gold loan will be similar in fiscal year 2030.
My question was, sir, on the growth guidance. Is it 25%+, or what are we targeting this year?
Oh, growth guidance. Growth guidance. Okay.
Yeah.
Wholesale will continue to grow the way it is growing at this point of time, which is somewhere between 35%-40%. Gold, I think we should grow around similar levels. We should be growing around 30%-35%, somewhere in that range. Okay? The question here is that how do we come to a 50% mix from a 54% mix if we don't grow the other businesses? That is something we have to solve. We are working on it.
Got it. ECLGs, how much disbursements have been done this year?
ECLGs, we have done around INR 60 crore. We are not aggressively marketing it. If customers are coming and asking for it, we are reviewing it, and we are doing it. We have done around INR 50 crore, INR 60 crore.
Got it. Sir, gold loan LTVs are at 75% versus other banks are below 65% or so when I compare the peers like Karur or City Union. What's the reason here, sir? Is there anything specific you could attribute to that?
Yeah. Our agri book is slightly higher because on agri book what happens is you can go up to 85%, okay? Easily.
Right.
Agri has one more advantage, is that you have PSL's income against it. Okay?
Right.
That's why. We have been doing this business for many years. We navigated a very challenging period when LTV was brought down from 90%- 75%, I think somewhere in 2023. We are pretty confident of our ability how to navigate this, even in a crisis situation, which happened in 2023. We didn't lose much money then also. We know the process, our people have the experience how to do it, et cetera, and now we have only improved from there. Given that we have been doing it, however, as per board guidance, now we are going to gradually bring down the agri portfolio. Automatically, as the mix changes, LTV will change because our non-gold portfolio LTV is somewhere between 50%-55% right now. Okay?
The regulatory framework, if it is 75%, on that, we are still 15%, 20% lesser than what the regulatory framework is. If we are able to change the mix little bit here and there, and we have just launched a product, income generating product or something like that we are calling it, which is more targeted towards people who are going to take loans and use it for earning, which is like a kind of a pseudo SME kind of a business. Those products we are launching now because we have the systems now to do it. Given that, I think gradually, we will have a glide path of the agri gold loan coming down. Once it comes down, naturally, as a mix, without changing any LTV in agri or normal, it will start coming down, over a period of time.
That's the real reason, and we are already working on it.
Got it, sir. Thank you. Thank you, sir.
Thank you so much, Puneet. Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question for today. On behalf of CSB Bank Limited, that concludes today's conference call. Thank you everyone for joining us, and you can now click on the leave icon to exit the meeting.
Thank you very much, everybody, and for joining the call, and look forward to seeing you again next quarter. Thank you very much.
Thank you, everyone.