SBI Cards & Payment Services Ltd

SBI Cards & Payment Services Ltd

545.00
INR
-21.10
(-3.73%)
25.07EPS
23.67P/E
564.74BMarket Cap
Jan 27Next Earn

Q4 FY2026 · Earnings Call TranscriptApril 27, 2026

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to SBI Cards and Payment Services Limited Q4 and FY '26 earnings conference call. 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 then zero on your touch-tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded.

I now hand the conference over to Ms. Salila Pande, MD and CEO, SBI Cards.

Thank you, and over to you, ma'am.

Salila Pande

Thank you, Danish. A very good afternoon to everyone.

On behalf of the board and management of SBI Cards, I would like to welcome and thank you for joining us today. I would like to extend our gratitude to all the stakeholders for their continued support and trust in the company.

At SBI Card, we remain focused on supporting India's rapidly evolving digital payment landscape while further reinforcing our position as India's largest pure-play credit card player. The Indian economy continues to demonstrate resilience despite ongoing geopolitical uncertainties, with real GDP projected to grow at around 6.9% for the financial year '26-'27.

As per IMF, Indian economy is likely to remain a bright spot in an increasingly uncertain global environment, with growth running at more than twice the global average, supported by strong underlying fundamentals. At the same time, some moderation may be seen due to elevated energy prices and external headwinds.

As per the recently released government data, India's retail inflation inched up to 3.4% year-on-year in March from 3.21% in February. Over the past few years, India's digital payment ecosystem has witnessed rapid transformation.

Digital transactions are becoming an integral part of everyday payments, supported by growing digital infrastructure, supportive regulatory initiatives, and a thriving fintech ecosystem. This shift has reshaped customer behavior, with payments becoming more frequent, smaller in terms of ticket size, and increasingly integrated with credit channels.

Digital transactions have grown almost 11 times between 2021 to 2025, with UPI accounting for almost 80% of overall digital transactions. Within this evolving payment landscape, credit cards continue to play a significant role, facilitating a rewarding, simple, safe, and seamless payments experience.

According to RBI March 2026 data, credit card spends during the year grew roughly 12% year-over-year to 23.62 trillion. The number of cards in force has crossed 118.6 million during this period, reflecting continued adoption across India's expanding base of aspirational customers.

As an agile organization, we at SBI Card recognize these opportunities and are committed to capitalizing on them to fuel growth. We continue to strengthen our position as India's largest pure-play credit card player and second-largest credit card issuer.

As a customer-centric organization, we are focused on delivering seamless customer journeys, differentiated product offerings, and personalized experiences. Hyper-personalization continues to be a key strategic lever for us.

During the year, we enhanced data-driven customer engagement capabilities, helping enhance customer lifetime value through the SBI Card mobile app and digital channels. Digital acquisition has gained momentum, with SBI Card Sprint a growing share of new account acquisitions is now initiated digitally, improving the speed and experience of customer onboarding journey.

During the year, we enhanced our product portfolio to meet evolving needs of aspirational and tech-savvy customers. For instance, during the year, we launched several co-branded credit cards, such as Tata Neu SBI Card, Flipkart SBI Card, IndiGo SBI Card, and PhonePe SBI Card SELECT.

Hundreds of national and regional offers were rolled out across all key spend categories in partnership with reputed brands to increase spends and engagement. One of the key priorities during the year was to control and reduce credit cost.

Our focus remained on maintaining portfolio resilience while supporting sustainable growth. We augmented our risk management framework, enhanced policies, procedures, models, and analytical capabilities across areas, including underwriting, portfolio management, collections, fraud risk management, and provisioning, while ensuring alignment with evolving regulatory expectations and industry best practices.

We further strengthened our collections infrastructure, both digital and physical. The focus was on encouraging customers to make timely repayments.

In case of a difficulty, we supported the customers with financial hardship tools. Technology investments in artificial intelligence and machine learning are playing a key role in transforming our product development and service delivery.

From optimizing internal processes, obtaining insights into customer behavior and preferences, upskilling employee to risk management framework, among others, we are poised to harness full potential of these advancements in financial year '27. Our ESG approach is based on four cornerstones of our commitment to a sustainable future: social prosperity, building trust, impactful integrity, and climate action.

This financial year, we also declared an interim dividend of ₹2.50 per equity share, enhancing shareholder value. As regards the business performance in Q4 and for the whole year, the results trajectory is well in line with what we had expected and conveyed during the year.

Let me share some key metrics. As per RBI March 2026 data, we continue to be the second-largest credit card issuer in the country, with cards in force market share of 18.6%.

During the quarter, we added 917,000 new accounts while maintaining a strong focus on quality-led acquisition. Our digital onboarding platform, SBI Card Sprint, continues to deliver encouraging results by enabling faster and seamless customer acquisition.

In terms of the new sourcing mix, our share from open market and banca channels in FY '26 stands at 54% and 46%, respectively. As per RBI's 2026 data, our spends market share has further grown to 18.1% in financial year '26.

Overall spends in Q4 FY '26 exceeded 1.15 trillion, with a strong 31% growth YoY. During FY '26, overall spends were 4.3 trillion, setting a new benchmark.

Retail spends witnessed steady growth, driven by rising adoption of digital payments and ongoing expansion of payment ecosystem. In Q4 of FY '26, retail spends reached ₹89,786 crore, with 13% growth YoY.

During FY '26, retail spends reached the highest-ever level of over 3.54 trillion, with a 15% growth YoY. 30-day retail spend active rate continues to be healthy at over 52% in Q4 of FY '26.

During the quarter, we have seen growth momentum across both POS and online channels. Key spend categories that particularly performed well include consumer durables, furnishing and hardware, apparel and jewelry, travel, and entertainment, among others.

Online spends contributed 62.5% of the total retail spends of FY '26. UPI on credit card usage continued to gain momentum, witnessing 10% growth in Q4 of FY '26 compared to Q3.

Department stores and grocery, utilities, fuel, apparel, and restaurants continue to be among the top five categories for UPI spends. Additionally, the ability to use RuPay credit cards through QR-based UPI acceptance terminals is gaining traction, particularly in Tier 2+ markets that have the highest UPI-active cards in force and UPI spends, adding to the growth momentum.

As regards the financial performance of the company during Q4 and FY '26, total revenue during Q4 was ₹5,187 crore, with 7% growth YoY. Total revenue for FY '26 was ₹20,708 crore, registering 11% growth YoY.

Increased spends this year resulted in higher spend-based income, contributing to healthy revenue growth. With lower credit cost this quarter over the previous quarter, we delivered a profit after tax of ₹609 crore in Q4, with 14% growth YoY.

For the financial year 2026, SBI Card achieved a profit after tax of ₹2,167 crore, with a 13% growth YoY. During Q4 FY '26, our receivables were at ₹56,926 crore, around 2% growth YoY.

The interest-earning assets were 54%, with revolver balance at 22%. Revolver rates have been in the range of 22% to 24% over the last two years, and we expect this to have a slight downward bias in FY '27.

We will continue to focus on building our EMI book. The cost of funds during Q4 was 6.4%, lower by 82 basis points YoY.

For FY '26, it was 6.7%, lower by 71 basis points. The net interest margin for the quarter has improved to 11.1% versus 11% in Q3.

For FY '26, it has improved to 11.2%, higher by 31 basis points YoY. We expect NIM to remain stable, though at risk from any significant increase in cost of fund as a result of uncertain macroeconomic conditions.

In Q4 FY '26, the opex has been lower compared to the previous quarter owing to lower spend-based cost. However, for FY '26, the opex was 22% higher YoY on account of higher corporate spends.

The cost-to-income ratio for Q4 was 57.2% and 55.3% for FY '26. The cost-to-income ratio was impacted by higher operating expense on account of higher corporate spends.

In terms of the asset quality, our gross credit cost has improved by 55 basis points quarter-over-quarter to 7.7%, continuing with the reducing trend as witnessed in the last two quarters as well. GNPA for the quarter was reduced by 46 basis points quarter-over-quarter to 2.41%.

The NPA stock has reduced by ₹268 crore quarter-over-quarter and ₹348 crore YoY to ₹1,370 crore. Stage 2 balance, which is portfolio at significant increase in credit risk, have reduced by ₹149 crore quarter-over-quarter and ₹711 crore YoY to ₹2,090 crore.

SBI Card delinquencies have continued to reduce in this quarter, too, as witnessed in the previous six quarters. Keeping in view the annual ECL model refresh and uncertainty due to geopolitical turmoil, we are retaining an overlay of ₹220 crore for ECL provision.

Owing to strengthened underwriting standards, portfolio management, and collections, asset quality continues to improve with better portfolio mix, reducing NPAs, and portfolio delinquencies. We expect the credit cost to moderate further in FY '27.

However, the rate of moderation in credit cost and asset quality will depend on the evolving geopolitical landscape and its impact on the macroeconomic factors and the unsecured lending ecosystem. We are vigilant and monitoring our portfolio for any likely impact of dynamic macroeconomic variables.

At the same time, with adequate capital and provision buffer, we do not foresee any significant impact in the coming quarter. Our capital adequacy ratio for Q4 was strong at a comfortable level of 25.5%.

The ROA for Q4 was 3.6%, 29 bps higher YoY, while for FY '26, ROA was 3.2%, 11 bps higher YoY. The ROE was 15.6%, 8 bps higher YoY, and 14.6% for FY '26, lower by 5 basis points YoY.

As we close FY '26, we remain optimistic about the long-term trajectory of India's consumer credit and digital payments ecosystem. Looking ahead to FY '27, we are ready and well-prepared with adequate buffers to pursue profitable growth in a disciplined manner.

It is important to reiterate that we remain vigilant regarding the geopolitical and economic landscape and will adapt our strategy if warranted. With that, we are now happy to take questions.

Thank you.

Operator

Thank you, ma'am. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin with the question-and-answer session.

Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touch-tone 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 assemble.

Mr. Ajmera, you may please proceed with your question.

Punit Ajmera

Yeah. Hi, thank you for the opportunity.

Am I audible?

Operator

Yes, you are.

Salila Pande

Yes,

Operator

please go ahead.

Punit Ajmera

Yeah. My first question is regarding new account addition.

Our new account addition has been significantly lower than, let's say, previous year. How do you see and attribute it going forward?

Salila Pande

As Mr. Ajmera, we had mentioned during our previous earnings call that we will target a acquisition of 900,000 to a million for the quarter, and we have ended this quarter with around 9.17 lakhs.

We are on track, and we had said that the growth will be calibrated. We look at the next quarter acquisition to be somewhere in the similar range and continue with the adding high-value, good quality customers, which ultimately add value to the overall financials of the company.

Punit Ajmera

Okay. My second question is regarding cost-to-income ratio.

This year it is around, let's say, 57.2%, which is, let's say, 6% almost higher than previous year. How do you see this going forward?

Rashmi Mohanty

We expect the cost to income to be in the range of 55% to 58% for the next year as well.

Punit Ajmera

Okay. Previously, it used to be around 51%, 52%.

What has changed into the company for—

Rashmi Mohanty

The change has largely been on account of the corporate spends because the corporate spends this year have been way higher than what they were last year. As you can see from the deck, there's a substantial increase in the corporate spends this year compared to the last year.

They basically add a few percentage points on the cost to income. Next year, since the growth will be a very BAU kind of a growth, we don't expect therefore a very significant increase in the cost to income because of the corporate spends.

It'll largely be the BAU revenue and the cost line, which will determine the cost-to-income ratio. Okay.

Punit Ajmera

The magnitude of change is majorly due to employee cost addition, or there is some another element attached to it? No, no,

Rashmi Mohanty

no. It's not employee cost.

There's normally a pass-back involved in the corporate spends on account of which the cost goes higher. That is the reason.

Overall, the business is profitable, but the margins are comparatively thinner, which basically boosts both on the cost and the income side. That is why the cost to income is higher.

It's not because of the employee growth.

Punit Ajmera

Okay. Any take on the card closure?

Salila Pande

Card closure, you mean attrition?

Punit Ajmera

Yeah.

Salila Pande

No, I think in fact, we are at par or in fact doing better than the industry. Would also like to add that if we look at the way that we have been working very extensively on customer engagement, which has also benefited us in terms of ensuring that the customers are retained.

That is also witnessed by the improvement that we are seeing in our market share in terms of the transaction numbers as well. Nothing significant there.

I would say that we are, if anything, at par or maybe better than the industry overall.

Punit Ajmera

Okay. Thank you for answers.

Salila Pande

Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, in order to ensure that the management will be able to address all the question from the participant, we request you to kindly limit your question to two question per participant.

If you have a follow-up question, please rejoin the queue. Our next question comes from the line of Piran Engineer from CLSA.

Please go ahead.

Piran Engineer

Yeah. Hi, team.

Congratulations on the strong improvement in asset quality. I have a couple of questions to ask, probably more industry-related, but also applies to you.

Now, just firstly in terms of growth, how should we think about cards in force growth now slipping to mid single digits from double digits over the last couple of years? It's true for y'all and the industry.

Is it, simply put, just underwriting tightening and as those filters are loosened, growth picks back up? Or is it just that applications itself are slowing down at the other end?

Salila Pande

Applications are definitely not slowing down. Your first point was correct.

Overall, I think the issuers had seen in the last couple of years back some asset quality issues. There is more tightening which has happened on the underwriting side.

That overall, it is also being seen that to a very large extent, very few new customers are being brought into the fold. It's normally the existing customers, credit-tested customers who are getting new cards issued by another new issuer.

Yes, there is a little bit of a caution, which has resulted in comparatively muted growth in the industry. Then

Piran Engineer

it's fair to say that out of this 9 to 10 lakh customers we acquire every quarter, bulk of them are existing to credit card, very few would be new to credit card as such?

Salila Pande

Not in our case, because, see, we also have a strong banca channel where we have visibility over customers who maybe new to credit or new to credit card. We also have separate underwriting models for them on which we work, and we bring them on fold as well.

Piran Engineer

Okay. Ma'am, what would the split be then, just a ballpark split between new to credit card and existing to credit card?

Girish Budhiraja

Piran, we usually don't give that, but open market numbers are primarily credit-tested customers. It is only in banca where we have view to the customer statements and debits and credits that we look at NTC and NTCC.

As of now, primarily, we're looking at NTCC there also, okay? You can fairly estimate that anywhere between 20% to 30% customers which we get from banca as of now are from NTC or NTCC.

Piran Engineer

Understood. Understood.

That's clear. My second question is just on revolvers.

Now, y'all have been highlighting this for the past couple of quarters that revolver is on a downward bias, and I understand it's hard to predict what an exact number would be, let's say, four quarters later. Let's say 22 becomes 19 or 20, hypothetically.

What's the game plan here, really? Do we start massively cutting our reward points, etc., for everyone?

Do we hike the revolver fee further from 3.75 to 4? My question is, how do we just protect profitability in a hypothetical scenario where revolver, say, falls to 20 or below?

Girish Budhiraja

Piran, we have not indicated a specific number as to where it's going to go, okay? There will be a downward bias.

We are looking at our portfolios very carefully. Last two years acquisition, as we have been saying, we have been selective, they are showing a lower revolving behavior.

However, first attempt that we will do is to compensate it through the installment lending portfolios rather than cutting a rewards program or doing something else. You already have mentioned two ideas, but there are multiple such things that can be done.

Whenever we do that, one has to keep an eye that a engaged spending customer should not get negatively impacted. There are multiple ways and means to balance these, and we will look at that.

As I stated, the installment lending would be our first chosen preference, and we would like to invest heavily there to get the asset build up there.

Piran Engineer

Got it. Got it.

Just on last, I'll squeeze in one last question for Rashmi. How do we think about cost of funds year on?

It was actually quite good that cost of funds declined in an environment where G-sec yield was rising. Getting into FY '27, what's the outlook?

Hi,

Rashmi Mohanty

Piran. I don't think it'll be a little too early for me to give you any guidance on the cost of funds, given that we are still not sure as to the RBI's stance, given the geopolitical tensions and the uncertainties in the environment.

Obviously, needless to say, we will continue to manage our portfolio well, keep looking at opportunities to reduce costs in all possible manners. I think it's too early for me to give you any kind of an indication for the full year.

Piran Engineer

Okay. Fair.

Fair. That's okay.

That's it from my end. Thanks and wish you all the best.

Salila Pande

Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Shizhuoan Guo from Scofield.

Please go ahead.

Sujal Ghorai

Hey, am I audible?

Salila Pande

Yes,

Sujal Ghorai

you're audible. Thank you so much for the opportunity.

Just follow up on the cost of funds question from Piran. How about next one to two quarters?

Is there still kind of a downward repricing room left on our cost of funds? Can we still decline?

Salila Pande

Sorry, can you repeat the question? Not very clear.

Sujal Ghorai

On the cost of funds, just for next one to two quarters, do we still have room to reprice our borrowings so that the cost of funds can still decline?

Rashmi Mohanty

As we've stated earlier as well that our borrowings do reprice anywhere in our 60 to a 90-day bucket. Yes, there will be some repricing that will happen over the next quarter also.

Yes.

Sujal Ghorai

Okay. Or

Rashmi Mohanty

is your question that will the repricing help us in a declining cost of funds? Is that your question?

Sujal Ghorai

Yes. Yes.

Rashmi Mohanty

See, I don't know about that right now. That's what I said earlier in the answer to the earlier question as well.

It all depends upon where we see the rates, given the macro environment.

Sujal Ghorai

I see. Just a technical one.

Just can you help me understand what's the denominator for your reported margin of 11.1%? I.e., is it a daily average basis or is a period-end average basis?

Because it's a bit confusing, given the loan book is flat quarter on quarter, NII is down 5%, and your margin is up 5 bps.

Rashmi Mohanty

The NIM and the cost of funds that you see in the table is on a 13-point average. Though separately, we do give out a daily average cost of funds, but the NIM that we publish is on a 13-point average.

Sujal Ghorai

Got it. Last one is on the other income.

These two quarters, the other income run rate is ₹200-odd crore, which used to be ₹100-odd crore. I'm just wondering is there any one-off components or is sustainable from here?

Salila Pande

Your voice is not clear, Shizhuoan, if you can— Are you saying that Other income is 200-plus?

Sujal Ghorai

Yeah. Your other income is up 60% year on year, right?

It used to be ₹100-odd crore.

Salila Pande

Up 60% year over year?

Sujal Ghorai

Yeah.

Salila Pande

Okay.

Sujal Ghorai

This year,

Salila Pande

this year in the other income, there have been some one-offs as well, which we have disclosed in the exchange filing, on account of certain provision release and another provision around the tax matter, where that number has been added to the other income for FY '26. Therefore, when you look at year on year, that number is higher and that number is higher for this quarter year

Sujal Ghorai

on year. All right.

Thank you so much.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Gaurav from MLP.

Please go ahead. Yeah.

Gaurav Kochar

Hi, good evening, and thanks for the opportunity. Three questions from my side.

Firstly, if I recollect, about 70% of your borrowings were linked to T-bills. Is that still the case?

Salila Pande

That's right, yeah. T-bills or repo rate.

About 70%,

Gaurav Kochar

75%

Salila Pande

of our borrowing is floating. Understood.

Gaurav Kochar

Understood. Assuming that the rate stays here, there's no further movement from rate, what do you expect, let's say, from next two-quarter perspective, where do your cost of fund move?

Salila Pande

Should stay stable in that case. Should stay stable.

Gaurav Kochar

Understood. Sure.

Sure. Second question.

Just to stress this a bit on margins, while you maintained that NIMs would remain stable, if I look at one percentage point of revolver mix, while we don't know what is the mix change that will happen in FY '27, but assuming even if there is a one percentage point drop, and that gets converted into EMI, there is still a 25, 27 basis point sort of hit on the interest income line or on margin. How do we plan to offset this if cost of funds remain stable, then what is the other offset that we are looking at when we say the margin will remain stable?

Girish Budhiraja

You're right, because revolvers are at a much higher rate, and 1% decline in revolver has to be compensated, obviously, with a larger mix on the installment lending side. You're absolutely right.

Maybe we will not be able to take care of it fully, but try to compensate it in some other manner. There are ways and means, as was being discussed two questions back, whether we look at some other fee income sources or some other scenarios.

This kept aside, as of now, we see a downward trend in the revolvers. As the things start improving, okay, and we have seen that our credit cost is on a downward trajectory, we will look at certain pilots or certain experiments with the segments which are marginal in nature to be able to see where we can build the asset.

Gaurav Kochar

Understood. Got it.

Got it. That's helpful.

My second question is with respect to cost to income. Now that you've clarified that the other income has a couple of one-offs, which I could read from notes to accounts, the adjusted cost to income for this quarter is surprisingly at 60%.

Particularly in fourth quarter, we see a lot of improvement versus 3Q because 3Q has a festive base. In this quarter, we saw the cost to income moved up to 60.

For the next year, while we are guiding 55% to 58%, how confident are we to be at the lower end of this guidance versus the higher end of this guidance?

Rashmi Mohanty

You're right that this particular quarter had a one-off, which obviously added to the denominator, and therefore, if adjusted for that, the cost to income would go up. As of now, as we look internally, as we look at FY '27, there are various initiatives on to ensure that the expense lines are contained.

As Girish and ma'am mentioned earlier, there are initiatives on to ensure that we actually book higher revenue line items, both on the interest income and the fee income. Given all of that, we do think that this number should stay between a 55% to 58%.

Gaurav Kochar

Okay. Got it.

Given that corporate spends would be in the base largely, why would it still remain elevated? Because in this quarter or this year, we saw that corporate spends were high, and hence, probably the cost to income went up.

Next year, I would have assumed that since that is in the base, there would be some improvement in cost to income.

Rashmi Mohanty

The fact they're already in the base would mean that the variation in the cost to income between this year and next year will not be very high. Because they are part of our business and therefore contributing both on the numerator and the denominator, we'll keep the actual metric high.

Gaurav Kochar

Got it.

Rashmi Mohanty

You won't see a big jump the way you saw it between last year and this year.

Girish Budhiraja

Actually, if you go two years back, this used to be broadly in a slightly higher than actually present number. It saw a very big decline, a drop when the corporate spend went off.

Gaurav Kochar

Right. Okay.

This is just the normalization with corporate spends at 25%. Is that the right way to think

Rashmi Mohanty

about it?

Gaurav Kochar

Yeah. Corporate spends are about 20-odd percent, not 25%.

Rashmi Mohanty

Yeah.

Operator

I'm sorry, but you can rejoin the queue for more questions. Sure.

Gaurav Kochar

Sure. Sure.

Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Mahrukh Adajania from Tara Capital.

Please go ahead.

Mahrukh Adajania

Yeah. Hi.

I had a couple of questions. Probably this was discussed earlier on the call also.

Our receivables growth is now 2% year on year. Given the war situation and given that even other banks and their commentary were not sounding very optimistic on credit cards growth or, to put it in other words, they were more bullish on other segments than cards.

How do you view your near-term growth, because of uncertainties and also because of lack of festive season? Growth is likely to remain subdued in the near term, right, one to two quarters, and then we look forward to the festive pickup.

Is that the correct assessment?

Salila Pande

Mahrukh, right now, we are not giving any guidance on asset growth. If you recall in the last earnings call, we had said that the asset growth will follow card acquisition growth.

We are building on card acquisition, and we expect that the asset growth will follow the card acquisition growth. Apart from that, as far as the war situation is concerned, I would say we are keeping a very close eye, but we have been cautious.

There is nothing additional in terms of putting the brakes or reducing the growth that we are working on. Having said that, we will continue to monitor the position and take corrective action, if need be.

As of now, we are not giving any guidance on the asset growth side.

Mahrukh Adajania

Got it. Regarding the provisioning reversal, we've had ₹47 crore of credit cost reversal, right?

We've seen that in the past few quarters as well. You have write-offs, which are possibly coming down, and then you are seeing a reversal on provisions.

Is that likely to continue? Because it's very difficult to forecast that number, right?

It's been zero or negative for quite some time.

Salila Pande

Mahrukh, these numbers, as actually we wrote back ₹47 crore, but as we mentioned, ₹220 crore of management overlay is being retained. To a very large extent, the overall ECL number is a function of my stocks in Stage 2, Stage 3 and the provision rate.

As we have shown in our financial results also, Stage 2, Stage 3 stocks have gone down substantially. On account of which, we have taken a small write-back of ₹47 crore, but we are still holding buffers to be ready and resilient for any, I would say, stress which may come in the environment because of the geopolitical risk.

Ultimately, it's the model which informs how we are retaining the ECL provision.

Mahrukh Adajania

Okay. Thanks a lot.

Thank you.

Salila Pande

Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. Reminder to all the participant to limit the question to two question per participant.

If you have a follow-up question, please rejoin the queue. Thank you.

Our next question comes from the line of Rohan M from Equirus Securities. Please go ahead.

Rohan M.

Good afternoon, thanks for the opportunity. Just on this ₹220 crore of additional provisions that we are carrying and the ₹100 crore increase that happened during the quarter, is it on account of the ECL refresh or have we made any incremental provisions there?

Girish Budhiraja

See, whatever provisions we are making, it is not because of the asset quality at all. You can see our Stage 2, Stage 3 is going down, we are selective in our underwriting.

There is no additional provision for that asset quality. However, because of the ECL model is still under refresh, and ma'am has already mentioned in the last question, the geopolitical environment is also uncertain.

Whatever ECL model provisions are coming, we have kept around ₹100 crore for that future also to take anything which is uncertain as on date.

Rohan M.

What I was trying to understand was this additional ₹100 crore increase that has happened in this quarter on the management overlay, that has been routed through the P&L?

Girish Budhiraja

Definitely. Or

Rohan M.

is it a release of the provision from the ECL refresh?

Girish Budhiraja

No, no, no, no. Every provision is from the P&L.

Rohan M.

Okay. If you had not increased the management overlay, then the reported provisions would have been lower by ₹100 crore.

Okay. Second is that—

Girish Budhiraja

Correct.

Rohan M.

Correct. Correct.

The

Girish Budhiraja

profit would be higher by ₹100

Salila Pande

crore. Profit would have been higher therefore, yes.

Rohan M.

Sure, got it. Sir, secondly, on the fresh slippages number, if you can quantify, what was it for 4Q versus 3Q?

Girish Budhiraja

See, we don't declare any slippages number, but you can see from the Stage 3, the stock has reduced by ₹268 crore. That means slippages are also going in a improved trajectory quarter on quarter.

Rohan M.

Sure, sir. Just on the one-offs that happened this quarter, how have they been accounted for in the P&L, which line item are they impacting?

If you can just help me refresh

Salila Pande

on that

Rohan M.

PIDF, what was that fund and what—

Salila Pande

Which one-off are you talking about?

Rohan M.

The PIDF and GST.

Salila Pande

Okay. The PIDF actually was reduced from the expenses because it was a provision that we were carrying along with the expenses, and since the expense didn't happen or the payment didn't happen, it has been reduced from the expenses.

The GST is a part of the other income line.

Rohan M.

Got it. What was this PIDF?

I'm not—

Operator

Sorry to interrupt you, sir, but you can rejoin the queue for follow-up question. Thank you.

Sure.

Rohan M.

Thanks.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Shubhanshu Mishra from Philip Capital. Please go ahead.

Shubhanshu Mishra

Hi, Girish. Hi, Rashmi.

A couple of questions. The first one is on the open market, both in terms of CIF as well as new sourcing, we are much above 50% now.

This would also reflect on our opex. While we talk about banca, the open market is weighing on our CIF as well as new sourcing, if you can speak about that.

Second is that out of the EMI pool, how many guys or what is the percentage of PL on CC? That is my second question.

Third is that we have barely grown in terms of our bottom line by around 13%, and yet we are giving out a dividend. Was that necessary?

We could have possibly not given a dividend and retained it and deployed it back into the business. Thanks.

Girish Budhiraja

I'll give you the answer for the first and second part before I give it to MD ma'am for the third. Rashmi, okay.

On the banca and open market, the strategy has been consistently that we would try and do 50-50 from both the channels, and if possible, 55 from banca and 45 from open market. That's the range that we will look at.

In the last one year, we have been broadly in the same range. However, our tie-ups with some of the digital partners like PhonePe, Flipkart, Tata Neu, IndiGo, some of these partners numbers are working in a very good direction, and they give a flip-up to the overall open market numbers.

That's why you see some amount of shift in the favor of open market. On a consistent long-term basis, our strategy is to remain 50% to 55% banca and 40% to 45% to 50% open market.

That is the first one. Secondly, on the installment lending portfolio, we have never given the break-up of PL on CC.

However, there are three kind of installment lending are there in the book. One is, as you said, PL on CC.

The second is what we call installment at the point of sale itself when people convert at the point of sale while purchasing an electronic good or others. The third part is before the payment due date, a whole lot of people convert their outstandings into installments.

These three constitute the overall book of the installment. On the dividend part, I'll—

Salila Pande

Shubhanshu, giving dividend, I think shareholders and investors are very critical and important stakeholders for the company, and they need to be rewarded for their capital and the belief and the trust that they have put in the company. If we don't have any asset quality issues, we don't have any capital adequacy issues.

We are under-leveraged actually, if you look at that. I would say that ₹2.50 per share is a pretty decent dividend or a return, which is due to the stakeholders.

Accordingly, the view has been taken by the board to provide it to the stakeholders. Thank you.

Shubhanshu Mishra

Fair. Sure.

Thanks. The new UI of the e-store is really great on the app.

That's just a comment, it's not a question. Thanks.

Salila Pande

The new UI on the app, he's commenting on that it's—

Shubhanshu Mishra

The e-store.

Girish Budhiraja

E-store

Shubhanshu Mishra

that's revamped. It's really great.

Girish Budhiraja

The e-store has been revamped. Yes.

Yes. You should check our website also.

Now fewer people are coming there, but we've revamped that also completely.

Shubhanshu Mishra

I'm done with my question. Thanks.

Thanks.

Operator

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one.

Okay. Our next question comes from the line of Rushabh Doshi from Nimriti Investment Advisor.

Please go ahead.

Rushabh Doshi

Hi. I just wanted to understand how rent as a spending category is doing and how much impact does it have on the total spends?

Girish Budhiraja

Rent as a category used to be very large till two years back. We started levying a fee on it.

For us, rental spends is a very low spending category as of now, okay? There is no impact on us of any kind.

In fact, when guidelines had come in that the third-party websites or apps should do the KYC for the landlord and without that they should not allow the rental payment, by that time our rental payments were already fairly low. All the growth that you see is actually despite rental de-growing to a large degree.

Rushabh Doshi

Okay. Thanks.

That's all from my side.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Anuj Singla from JP Morgan.

Please go ahead.

Anuj Singla

Yeah. Good afternoon.

Thanks for the opportunity. First question is on the receivable growth.

Obviously, we have seen a deceleration there to 2%. If I recall, we have been flagging that we will see a increase in the new card acquisition and receivable growth will follow.

Should we see that FY '27 the new card acquisition and the receivable growth acceleration only in FY '28? Is that the scenario we should be looking at?

Salila Pande

Anuj, right now, as I mentioned earlier also, I would not give any guidance on the asset growth. We continue to stick with what we had said earlier that we are working on the card acquisition.

The guidance is around 900,000 to a million in a quarter. As you mentioned, that will lead to asset growth in the coming days.

Right now, not giving any guidance on the numbers. Fair enough.

Anuj Singla

Fair enough. Secondly, on the asset mix, while revolver has been trending down for the past many quarters, one offset was supposed to be EMI.

I think Girish has talked about in the past that there have been various initiatives to incentivize conversion to EMI. When I look at this quarter, even EMI has been pretty weak.

Can you talk about the trends there, and is that one of the offset we should be looking for towards offsetting the lower revolver in FY '27 or '28? Thank you.

Girish Budhiraja

Anuj, you're right. What happens is during the festival season, a whole lot of installment lending at the point of sale happens.

In the month of September or in October, a large quantity of spends which happened during the festival period gets converted into installment. Most of these installments, because average tenor is around 7.5, 8 months.

Either people pick up 6 months, 9 months, or 12 months tenors. What happens is by the end of February, March, the first lot of six-month tenor cases come up for full completion.

That is why you see a decline on the installment asset. This is typically a trend over years, and it gets built up.

Yes, it is a continuous treadmill and we have to continue to get new asset build up here, but that is the nature of the business. As I stated earlier, some amount of revolving we would be able to offset with installment lending.

Not fully, we'll have to see at other mechanisms to be able to balance and look at income sources.

Anuj Singla

Girish, follow up on that. When I look at the YoY trends, which will take care of the seasonality which you spoke about, they also is declined from 35 to 32, right?

I'm assuming that if you include the festive seasonality in both the years, still we should have seen a stable or improving performance. Even that's not the case.

Just trying to understand if there is something beyond our initiatives— No, no,

Girish Budhiraja

no. When we looked at the data, this was one part.

Second part was, year on year there was some impact of we were doing Apple offer last year. This year, for the last quarter, it was not there.

There was some amount of impact of some of those things, okay? These are I would say transient and can be taken care of within next three to six months.

Anuj Singla

Okay. Okay.

Got it. Thank you.

Thanks, Girish.

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Pranav Shah from 3P Investment Managers.

Please go ahead.

Pranav Shah

Hi, thanks for taking my question. Just a couple of them, bookkeeping ones.

Your recoveries have shown pretty good traction now nearing almost ₹190 crore. Could you give a sense of how large your perhaps written-off book is, where you expect still sizable maybe 10% to 15% recoveries to happen?

Salila Pande

We don't disclose the written-off portfolio that we have. We have intensified efforts on the recovery in terms of the written-off pool, and that is reaping benefits for us.

Pranav Shah

You expect this number to keep inching up from this ₹190 CR levels?

Salila Pande

It'll be somewhere in a similar range because now we are seeing a downward trajectory in terms of the write-offs as well. The efforts will continue to recover the most.

Pranav Shah

All right. Understood.

Generally in your presentations, you used to disclose the salaried and self-employed breakup. If you could give that for this quarter?

Salila Pande

What was that?

Girish Budhiraja

Salaried, self-employed.

Pranav Shah

In new sourcing.

Salila Pande

Do we have that breakup? Around 70%.

Sharing that salaried— During the quarter, 70% salaried.

Pranav Shah

70% was salaried?

Salila Pande

Yeah.

Pranav Shah

Actually, if I look at the last two quarters, I think even last quarter was 72%, this quarter was 70%. This is on the salaried side, I think self-employed used to be in that 40% to 50% range.

Do you intend to increase sourcing in the self-employed segment, or it's a conscious choice to slow down that right now?

Girish Budhiraja

See, from the beginning of the call, we are mentioning that we are quite selective in our selection of the customer due to our asset quality or other portfolio management. We are mindful while selecting the customer and onboarding for the card.

In the last quarter, it was shown that more application from the salaried customer and good customer are from the salaried one, that's why we onboarded them. It is not as that we are declining self-employed customer, but whatever good customers are coming, we are onboarding them.

Pranav Shah

All right. Understood.

Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. We'll take the last question from the line of Atul Kumar from Salvation Capital.

Please go ahead.

Atul Kumar

Yeah. Hi, thanks for the opportunity.

The question was on the side of credit cost, what kind of moderation can be expected? Given that credit costs have been higher for some time.

Related to that, in terms of ROAs, at one point of time, we used to have a 5%, from there a moderation to 3%, 3.5%. On that side, I'd like to know.

Thanks.

Salila Pande

Atul, although we are not giving any guidance in terms of the credit cost numbers right now, but we will continue to see moderation in terms of the credit cost, which is very evident if you look at the stocks also. We are seeing continuous reduction in our Stage 3 and Stage 2 stocks.

Accordingly, the credit cost will continue to trend downwards. On the ROA, again, we have said in the prior earnings calls as well that we are aiming towards 4% to 4.5% of ROA in the medium term, and that is achievable and we are working towards it.

Atul Kumar

Okay. Thank you.

Salila Pande

Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question for today.

I would now like to hand the conference over to Ms. Salila Pande for closing comments.

Thank you, and over to you, ma'am.

Salila Pande

Thank you, Danish. I would like to sincerely thank shareholders, customers, partners, and employees for instilling their trust, support, and confidence in the company.

Thank you once again and wishing all a successful financial year 2027.

Operator

Thank you, ma'am. Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of SBI Cards and Payment Services Limited, that conclude this conference.

Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines.