SBI's earnings shoot up 28%, beat estimates

Other income expands sharply but provisioning too

- Abhijit Lele

Exceeding estimates, State Bank of India—the country's largest lender—reported a 27.92 percent increase in net profit year-on-year for the July-September 2024 quarter, driven by a sharp rise in non-interest income, including treasury and foreign exchange earnings.

The net profit reached ₹18,331 crore in Q2FY25, up from ₹14,330 crore in the same quarter last year. This was higher than Bloomberg's consensus estimate of ₹16,000 crore in net earnings. Sequentially, the profit increased 7.61 percent from ₹17,035 crore.

Despite this, SBI's share price declined 1.86 percent to ₹843.25 apiece on Friday as the lender posted a sharp rise in loan-loss provisions.

The bank also said it had been "endeavouring" towards 12-13 percent deposit growth but "will probably not be able to reach that by FY25".

SBI Chairman C S Setty, who took the helm in August, said the bank aims to be India's first company to achieve ₹1 trillion in net profit, though the immediate goal is ₹1 trillion in operating profit. "We are almost there," he stated.

The bank posted ₹93,797 crore in operating profit and ₹61,076 crore in net profit in FY24; the timeline for hitting the ₹1 trillion net profit target remains under consideration.

SBI's net interest income (NII)—the difference between interest earned and expended—grew 5.37 percent year-on-year to ₹41,620 crore. But it rose just 1.2 percent from ₹41,125 crore in Q1FY25.