Despite a volatile interest rate environment and a crisis caused by infrastructure lending group IL&FS, non-banking financial company Bajaj Finserv posted a healthy 39 per cent growth in its consolidated total income at ₹11,142 crore during the third quarter of financial year 2019 as against ₹8,005 crore in the year-ago period.
The consolidated profit after tax went up by 16 per cent at ₹851 crore during the quarter against ₹731 crore aided by a strong growth in its consumer finance business. The Pune-based NBFC’s consumer and housing finance arm Bajaj Finance posted the highest ever profits during the quarter with a 54 per cent growth. The NPAs stood at 0.62 per cent.
The October-December quarter of FY19 saw a widening credit spreads and unusually tight liquidity conditions for NBFCs and housing finance companies (HFCs) after IL&FS disclosed that if has a default of over ₹90,000 crore.
S Sreenivasan, CFO, Bajaj Finserv, said that though there were challenges during the quarter, the company managed to sail through by managing its risks.
He also added that its consumer and home loan continued to grow. The housing business is currently about 28 per cent of the total book size.
The company expects the SME lending to grow in the coming quarters as the sector is slowly wriggling out of the crisis due to demonetisation and GST.
The SME has posted a 39 per cent growth and is currently forms about 13 per cent if the book size. It is expected to grow further, Sreenivasan said.
The company also expects its new businesses such as retail, ULIP, term insurance among others to be profitable by end of this fiscal.