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Informist, Saturday, Oct. 18, 2025

 

--ICICI Bank: Objective is to improve CASA ratio in future qtrs

--CONTEXT: Comments by ICICI Bank mgmt in post-earnings analyst concall

 

By Priyasmita Dutta and Gopika Balasubramanium

 

NEW DELHI/MUMBAI – Banking on the hope that the Indian economy will do better in the second half of the current fiscal, ICICI Bank expects its business to do better in Oct-Mar, focussing on improving the current account savings account ratio on the deposit side and rural, agriculture, and micro, medium, and small enterprises, or RAM, portfolio on the advances side, the bank's management said in a post-earnings analyst call Saturday. "...which will collectively support improvement in net interest margin and overall profitability," the management said.

 

ICICI Bank's total advances at the end of September quarter were INR 14.08 trillion, up 10.3% on year. Of this, net domestic advances grew by 10.6% on year and 3.3% sequentially at the end of September. The retail loan portfolio grew by 6.6% year-on-year and 2.6% sequentially, and comprised 52.1% of the total loan portfolio as on Sept. 30.

 

Domestic loan portfolio grew by 10.6% on year to INR 13.75 trillion at the end of Sept. 30, the bank said in a press release earlier in the day. Average deposits during the period were up 9.1% at INR 15.57 trillion. Average current account and savings account ratio was 39.2% in Jul-Sept, the bank said. The bank's current account and savings account ratio was 38.7% end of June and 38.9% end of September last year.

 

Speaking about the bank's net interest margin, the management said in Oct-Dec, there will be some deposit repricing leading to pressure on margins, but as such, it will remain range bound. "We do not expect any major movements either way," the management said.

 

"There will also be the full CRR (Cash Reserve Ratio) deduction, which will take effect. At the same time, it will be a KCC (Kisan Credit Card) quarter, as we call it, so the level of nonaccrual will also go up. And, of course, there are continuing competitive dynamics in the market. So, all taken together, I would say that over the next couple of quarters, we see it being range-bound."

 

In the quarter ended September, ICICI Bank's net interest margin declined, although in low-single digit, and was much better than the industry average. ICICI Bank's net interest margin declined by 4 basis points to 4.30% from 4.34% at the end of June.

 

The Reserve Bank of India has cut the benchmark interest rate by 100 bps to 5.50% so far in 2025, and a majority of this rate transmission is expected to have taken place in the reporting quarter. The Monetary Policy Committee had reduced the repo rate by 25 bps each in February and April, before effecting a 50-bps repo rate cut in June.

 

The large private sector lender's net profit for Jul-Sept was INR 123.59 billion, up 5.2% on year. This was slightly higher than analysts' expectation of INR 123.15 billion. Sequentially, the net profit was down 3.2%. Shares of the bank ended 1.4% higher on Friday at INR 1,436.60 on the National Stock Exchange.  End

 

Edited by Ashish Shirke

 

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