L&T Finance Q3 net profit jumps 39% to Rs 454 crore on record retail loan sales

L&T Finance Holdings on Friday reported a 39 per cent jump in net income to Rs 454 crore for the December 2022 quarter, driven by record retail loan sales.

The Mumbai-based non-banking lender said the highest-ever quarterly retail loan sales had its retail portfolio mix rising to 64 per cent of the total loan book, up from 58 per cent in the year-ago quarter, Dinanath Dubhashi, the managing director & chief executive of the company, said in a statement.

Of the total net profit, as much as Rs 394 crore came in from the retail book, which rose a full 76 per cent, on a loan book of Rs 57,000 crore — a growth of 34 per cent led by rural business, farm equipment finance and two-wheeler finance. During the quarter, retail disbursements rose 13 per cent to Rs 11,607 crore.

Its wholesale book declined 24 per cent to Rs 31,010 crore from Rs 37,597 crore.

The key profitability gauge net interest margin and fee income rose 70 bps to 8.80 per cent due to changing portfolio mix towards retail. Retail NIM and fees reached 11.38 per cent, up 25 bps.

Gross bad loans stood at 4.21 per cent or Rs 3,723 crore, down 248 bps from 6.69 per cent or Rs 5,623 crore, bringing down net NPAs to 1.72 per cent or Rs 1,487 crore, down by 145 bps from 3.17 per cent or Rs 2,565 crore as of December 2021.

Commenting on the results, Dubhashi said the company is progressing well on its journey towards mission 2026 to become a digitally-enabled retail finance company.