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Credit cards continue to see strong traction in February with outstanding credit cards at 7.17 crore. This adds up to an addition of 14.5 lakh new cards from 7.02 crore credit cards in January.
It also translates into a 16.3 per cent growth in the number of credit cards on a year-on-year basis from 6.16 crore cards in February 2021, the highest in 21 months.
Axis Bank was the largest issuer of credit cards last month, adding 2.47 lakh new credit cards to take its total count to a little over 86 lakh cards. HDFC Bank continued to retain its position as the market leader with 1.62 crore outstanding credit cards in February, adding 2.27 lakh new cards in the month. Other private sector lenders — including Kotak Mahindra Bank, ICICI Bank and RBL Bank — also saw good growth in credit card issuances.
Most banks have been upbeat about their credit card portfolios and have been working on adding more customers.
Spends drop month-on-month
Credit card spends also grew by 43 per cent year-on-year in February to ₹86,304.76 crore. However, it registered a modest two per cent decline compared to ₹88,037.91 crore in January.
“Spends witnessed a modest traction led by constant moderation in new infections and rising share of e-commerce transactions, which will keep growth in spends buoyant,” said Motilal Oswal in a recent note.
“The banking system reported net additions of about 1.5 million credit cards in February 2022. This has taken its total credit card base to 71.7 million (16.3 per cent growth year-on-year; the highest in the past 21 months),” it said.
It added that monthly spends per card for the industry declined by four per cent month-on-month to about ₹12,000, closer to the one-year average of about ₹11,900 (higher than pre-Covid levels).
Ticket size rose to about ₹4,600, while the number of transactions per card fell by six per cent month-on-month to 2.6, it said.
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