Corporates May Return to Banks for Credit Due to Hardening of Bond Yields: SBI Official

Corporates may return to commercial banks to meet their credit needs due to hardening of bond yields in the debt market, an official of State Bank of India (SBI) said on Wednesday.

Rama Mohan Rao Amara, managing director (international banking and global) markets of SBI, said that corporates are now coming to banks to meet their credit demands.

"What we have seen is that issuance of debt paper volumes has come down in the current quarter. In the first quarter, issuances were to the extent of Rs three lakh crore, which has come down in the current quarter as yields are hardening," Amara told reporters on the sidelines of a CII event here.

He said, “Ten-year yields have gone up by 6.6%, while that of 30-year bonds of the state governments has gone up to 7.5%. If the yields continue to rise like this, corporates will come back to the banks for credit." This is a dynamic situation and needs to be assessed, he said.

Regarding the imposition of higher tariffs by the US, he said its impact can be ascertained in the current quarter.

Earlier, Amara said that the domestic banks have adequate capital to finance growth. The banks are keen to lend to sunrise sectors like renewable energy and start-ups.

Director (banking), Department of Financial Services of the finance ministry, Hardik Mukesh Sheth, said the credit to GDP ratio for India is 65% to 70%, while that of the developed countries is almost 100%.

He said that the digital public infrastructure like the UPI (unified payments interface) is gaining popularity, and there has been a big shift in customer behaviour which is seeing increasing adoption of digitalisation.

Sheth said that in the last eight years, the public sector banks (PSBs) have gone for technology modernisation and digitalisation. The return on assets of PSBs has gone up significantly. The PSBs need to face the dual tasks of managing compliance and meet technology costs.