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Mumbai: The country’s largest lender State Bank of India (SBI) is aiming for higher loan growth of 12-14 per cent this year than the 11 per cent it had earlier envisaged buoyed by Goods and Services Tax (GST) rate cuts and the credit reforms undertaken by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). SBI’s total business crossed Rs 100 lakh crore in Q2 FY26, aided by strong consumption and double-digit growth in all segments except corporate credit.Speaking to reporters at the Bank’s Q2FY26 earnings press conference on Tuesday, SBI chairman CS Setty said, "The banking reforms announced as part of the monetary policy are credit accretive and will push up bank credit growth by one percentage point. We are revising our credit growth target from 11 per cent to 12-14 per cent.”He was referring to RBI’s recent move to allow banks to fund acquisitions and raising the cap on loans for buying shares at IPOs.Setty said that while the demand for credit in the retail, agriculture, and MSME segments is expected to remain robust, corporate loan growth has been flat last quarter as companies borrowed from the bond market. There have also been repayment of loans from companies that had cash or had raised equity which impacted corporate growth, but it has slowly picked up to 7.1 per cent in Q2 and should touch double digits in the next two quarters. He said that the lender has Rs 7 lakh crore of corporate loans in the pipeline from various sectors including power, renewable energy, hydrocarbons, iron and steel and real estate. Speaking about GST rate cuts, Setty said that the bank witnessed phenomenal pickup in car loans during the last 7-8 days post the GST rate cuts.On a question on funding M&As, Setty said that the lender would be open to collaborating with foreign banks in this space. “We know corporates very well and I don't think (acquisition financing) will be new to us. We don’t mind collaborating with foreign banks.”SBI reported a 10 per cent rise in standalone net profit to Rs 20,160 crore for the July-September quarter of 2025–26 (Q2FY26), aided by gains from its stake sale in Yes Bank. Sequentially, profit rose 5.22 per cent from Rs 19,160 crore in Q1FY26. Net Interest income (NII), the difference between interest earned and interest expended, increased 3.28 per cent Y-o-Y to Rs 42,984 crore. Net interest margin (NIM) from domestic operations fell by 18 basis points (bps) to 3.09 per cent from 3.27 per cent a year ago. Gross non-performing assets ratio declined 40 basis points to 1.73 per cent from 2.13 per cent in Q2FY25 and from 1.83 per cent in June 2025.
