Fino Payments Bank Limited (FINOPB) Q2 2027 Earnings Call Transcript

Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Finno Payments Bank for Q2FY27 Earnings Conference Call hosted by GoIndia Advisors. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in the listen-only mode and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during this conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star, then zero on your touch-tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Ms. Sheetal Khanduja from Go India Advisor. Thank you. And over to you, ma'am.

Thank you, Huda. Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the Q2FI27 Earnings Call of Fino Payments Bank. We have on the call Mr. Ketan Merchant, Interim Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Anup Agarwal, Interim Chief Financial Officer, and Mr. Tejas Mania, Chief Digital and Liabilities Officer. We must remind you that the discussion on today's call may include certain forward-looking statements and must be therefore viewed in conjunction with the risk that the company faces. May I now request the management to take us through the financials and the business outlook, subsequent to which we will open the floor for Q&A. Thank you and over to you, Ketan.

Thank you, Sheetal. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us on Fino Payment Bank Earnings Call for the second quarter and first half of FY27. Let me begin with where we stand on our journey of becoming small finance bank. We are making steady and visible progress and remain on track to meet RBI stipulated conditions within the prescribed timeline. On SFP preparedness, we made meaningful progress this quarter across technology, people, and process. On the people On the technology front, we strengthen our leadership team with four senior executives who will drive branch banking, liabilities, credit risk, and MSME lending. Each of them brings a unique set of skills and expertise to the table, backed by over two decades of experience in banking industry. On technology front, we are building capabilities which complements our existing distribution ecosystem, enhancing our enterprise-wide technology architecture, and create seamless customer journeys from sourcing to sanction and execution with minimum manual intervention. On the process and project management and governance, PricewaterhouseCoopers continues to support our program and operational readiness. We are establishing a robust governance risk and compliance framework, along with a core policy suit that a small finance bank requires. These are investments we are making ahead of growth, however important from the long-term sustainable perspective. Turning to our loan referral business, which serves as a foundation of our broader lending franchise, Total dispersals in Q2 was 7.62 crores, up by 286% on a year-on-year basis, while for H-127, dispersals stood at INR 1,390 crores, already surpassing full-year levels of FY26, which stood at 1,285 crores. We have consciously kept this business centred on collateral-based lending, which aligns with our strategy on secured portfolio once we enter the small finance bank era. Beyond fee income today, referral business deepens organizational insights into customer credit, market demand, servicing experience, and stronger lending partnerships ahead of the launch of our own lending business. This growth currently being businessed is a testimony to scalability of our differentiated credit sourcing model through merchants. Our capital position continues to remain comfortable, and we are above the regulatory requirement for the proposed small finance bank. And our business plan through FY30 remains exactly the same as we had predicted earlier. We will continue to build a predominantly fee-based business and strong liability franchise, complemented by a secured lending portfolio. Coming to our liability franchise, this remains the cornerstone of our model and our biggest strategic differentiator. Our CASA base is inching towards a 2 crore mark, having reached 1.91 crore as at September 2026. This quarter saw 8.2 lakh new accounts open, averaging roughly one new account being open every 10 seconds. Average total deposit grew by 12% on a YOI basis to 2,794 crores, continuing its growth momentum. To further strengthen the deposit base, we have launched a daily deposit plan product wherein merchant would get the customers to deposit fixed daily amounts in the account and thereby encouraging customers to save and build discipline, saving habits, and convenience to small vendors through deposit in their bank account every evening post-banking hours. In addition, we are also planning to launch value savings account in partnership with NBFC and other institutions, which are our CMS business associates, to cater to customers obtaining loans from these financial institutions, that is B2B2C, customer acquisition strategy. CASA segment contributed 174 crores, or 52% of our revenue, including a record renewal income of 74.6 crores, which we see as one of the biggest indicators of sustainable retail income. Our cost of funds for Q2 27 was 1.4%, giving FINO a structural cost advantage. Further, we expect our cost of funds to be around 4% even after SFB conversion, retaining an advantage of roughly around 250-300 basis points over the traditional SFBs. Our more than 20 lakhs strong AssetLite merchant network remains a key competitive strength. It helps us acquire customers at a relatively low cost and gives us a ready distribution platform for future banking and lending products. Digital engagement also continues to deepen as digitally active customers in September 26 stood at 64.9 lakhs, while for the entire second quarter of FY27, it stood at 87.9 lakhs. Turning to our traditional transaction business, we saw a sequential increase in throughput and revenue from remittance and other enabled payments system. Overall, UPI continues to dominate the ecosystem and driving behavioral shift from cash or card-based small-ticket-sized transactions to UPI. To address this shift, we have launched cash at UPI wherein a customer will be able to withdraw cash using UPI at a Fino Merchant Point. In times to come, this has potential to increase and serve as a replacement of traditional ATMs. Further, NPCI, along with partner banks, including Sino, launched a third-party cash deposit product backed by AEPs during the Global Fintech Festival 2026, wherein customers can deposit cash into other person's beneficiary account by providing valid KYC and authentication. This will also provide some support to the transaction business volumes. Our B2B business CMS throughput grew 13% sequentially and 12% on a wire-wide basis to 20,511 crores. The uptick was a result, reaffirming the confidence of our business alliances, NBFCs, fintech, e-commerce, and others in our institution. Competition in this segment continues to weigh on pricing. Hence, our focus remains on volume and network engagement and reinstatement of our earlier B2B partners. In Q1 FY27, our B2B and Alliance business had reduced due to skepticism of an event which had happened. Now in Q2 and more, we are indeed working towards regaining the market share in this Alliance and B2B space, as seen in the CMS and Alliance's numbers, which I just stated earlier. On digital business front, we had indicated the relaunch of our UPI B2B P2M segment during the year, and I am happy to share that we are on track and shall be resuming these services or this product by Q4 FY27. Overall, Q2-FY27 or H1-FY27 was a period of consolidation, execution against our strategic priorities of winning back our partners. We continued to strengthen our liability franchise, advance our SFB roadmap across technology, people, and governance, and rebuilt our cash services for UPI First World while absorbing the cost of that investment. Our objective remains to build a differentiated digital-led AI-driven small finance bank anchored on three enduring strengths, the strong liability-first franchise with a structural cost-of-punt advantage, a predominantly secured and asset-light lending model powered by our physical distribution network, and technology-led operating platform built around clinical and AI-enabled lending capabilities. FI 27 remains the transition here, and our priorities are unchanged. Sustainable long-term vision and growth, discipline, execution, and investment for growth are our key priorities for this year. With that, let me hand it over to Anup to take you through the financial performance in more details. Over to you, Anup.

Thank you, Ketan. Good evening, everyone. Let me start with the overall perspective. In Q1 FY27, our revenue recovered sequentially supported by recovery in both retail transaction business and our B2B alliances business. Our net revenue margin compressed sequentially but remained higher than last year due to higher contribution from the high margin CASA segment. Our liability continued to strengthen and deepen digital presence. Revenue for the Our quarter stood at 333.6 crores, up 9% sequentially and down 17% year on year. For the first half of the physical, revenue was around 640 crores, down 25% year on year. The year on year decline is largely driven by recalibration of our B2B, B2M business. Our sequential growth across all revenue verticals during Q2 F527 over Q1 demonstrates confidence of our merchants, business alliances, and other associates in the institution. Throughput grew by 4% sequentially to 1.15 lakh crores, despite ecosystem challenges on new manners, enhanced daily inquiries, tough competition in the B2B alliances business. In terms of mix, CASA contributed around 52% of the total revenue. Tradition transition business and B2B alliances regained some volumes during the quarter. Net revenue was around 127.1 crore, down 14% year-on-year. However, sequentially, it's grew by 3%. Our net revenue margin was around 38.1%, which is 100 basis points higher than the last year's net revenue margin. And however, it is lowered by 450 basis points sequentially. Similarly, for the first half, our net revenue margin was around 40.3% against 35.2% a year ago, an improvement in 500 basis points, which reflects structural improvement in the quality of our revenue mix. On the expense side, our operating costs marginally grew by 5.8% year on year and 4.5% sequentially. For the first half, the operating cost was around 180 crores, up only 1.6% year on year. Our cost to income ratio improved to 27.6% in quarter 2 versus 28.7 in quarter 1. We are maintaining frugality and in parallel investing in technology and talent. Moving to profitability, EBITDA was around 35.1 crore with a margin of 10.5% compared with 61.6 crore a year ago and 43.1 crore in quarter one. In terms of cash profit, we continue to remain positive. We will continue to invest in people, process, and technology, which might have an impact in the short-term profitability. However, building long-term, robust, sustainable, and resilient institutions. Coming to our further operations, our liability franchise continues to be the strongest pillar of our business. Account opening momentum was sustained with 8.2 lakh new The CASA renewal revenue showing highest ever during any quarter. Our deposits grew at around 12% to 2,794 crores during the quarter. The growth of CASA keeps improving the quality of our earnings today as its contribution keeps rising and creates a solid funding base for a small finance bank. In the traditional transaction business, APS and remittance recovered 50% and 18% sequentially, due to an increase in the DBT activity during the quarter. Coming to our B2B business, CMS segment throughput grew 12% year-on-year to 20,500 crores. As mentioned earlier, it was part of our regaining the business volume strategy. The pricing competition still exists in this space, which has impacted the big trades, but we believe the sustained throughput will contribute to revenue and subsequently to the profitability. Our loan referral business, as mentioned by Keitan, which is a foundation or a starting point for our launch of SFD, saw disbursals increase by 2.5x year-on-year to 1,390 crore in H-127. The pipeline remains aligned with the secured segments we intend to focus on, namely gold loans, affordable housing, loan against property, and secured MSME lending. Our fund management treasury, despite rate cuts during FY26, we have been able to deliver high yields of approximately 100 basis points than the market yields, which also has contributed to our revenue. On the regulatory front, our net worth and capital eloquence are well above the regulatory requirements, even from an S&P perspective. Looking ahead, our strategic direction is unaltered. We will continue to strengthen our liability franchise, maintain discipline, cost management, and invest selectively in capabilities required for the transition. Overall, we believe the foundation we are building together with our structural funding advantage, discipline execution, and focus on secured lending positions as well to create sustainable long-term value for our stakeholders. With that, we are happy to take any questions. Thank you.

Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and 1 on their touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and 2. Participants are requested to use handset while asking a question. A request to all participants, please to stick your questions to two questions per participant. For more questions, please rejoin the queue. Let's wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Ankit Kanodia from Zen Nivesh. Please proceed.

Thank you for taking my question and congratulations on a good run rate on the referral loan. So, my first question is regarding the slide number 12 where we have mentioned about the SFP timeline, and we say that submission of final readiness to the RBI and go live in Q1 FY28. How confident we are that we'll be able to achieve it? Do we see any delays which can happen maybe from RBI side, or are we very confident that we'll be able to start by Q1? That's my first question, sir.

Hi, Ankit. Thanks. Ketan here. I think it's a very pertinent question. As I said earlier, we are working towards the projects. We are a listed bank and we are a scheduled bank, so a lot of the liability franchise, etc. is already built in across. As we captured across in slide 12, currently as we speak, we are tracking on that kind of schedule and timetable. As regards to how RBI looks at it, what timelines, etc., that's something which we cannot comment across as well. But as we speak, I would just like to reiterate the point that we are tracking the SFB timelines as they are, you know, what is meant for us currently and what is captured on slide 12.

Great. So my next question is related to MDR. In the previous call, I asked this, and I think you mentioned that, yes, MDR would be a definite positive for us. Now that MDR has been pushed to January, how do we see that directionally? I'm not asking for any guidance. Directionally, how does that help us from Q3 onwards if it comes into effect? Any color you want to share on that?

I'll get a chance to maybe answer that. He's best placed amongst all of us.

Hi, Ankit. Just a fair question. Currently, we have prepared ourselves any which ways from a relaunch point of view. Outside of that, we are speaking to our potential partners with respect to our current, you know, partnerships. But, as we said, once the MDR comes, is when we will be able to actually go ahead and give some amount of guidance. But, I mean, my guess is as good as yours as to when it will be actually implemented. So, there is no point right now to be very honest in putting the horse before the cart or the cart before the horse.

Yeah, fair enough, sir. And my next question is, this new product which we launched, cash at UPI and daily deposit plan, these are also fee-generating products. So, will MDR impact here as well, or do we see it is outside the purview of MDR?

So, just to put a perspective, and it's a good question, our daily deposit plan is not a fee generating. It is one of our initiative to increase the float balances. This is to inculcate where a small-time account holder, a small-time vendor, every day after the working hours where the bank is done, and he's done through his daily business throughput, etc., he can deposit an X amount at any point of time. I'm in the evening or night into our bank account. So, instead of keeping cash, he can get some interest coming out of that. So, daily deposit is something which we are catering to enhance our liability franchise. Cash on UPI and the other Aadhaar-enabled payment system. Just to, you know, corroborate what is cash on UPI, just let us keep it very simple. As I said earlier, it is a NPCI-approved product wherein we can, you know, instead of using an Aadhaar-enabled payment system debit card for ATM, a QR dynamic QR code generated and a withdrawal can happen. That will be a fee-based product. It does not entail any kind of an MDR coming across out there. Third product is the Aadhaar-enabled deposit payment. That also is not linked to MDR in any manner.

Thank you so much for the detailed answer. One last question, if I may. Regarding the referral loans, as we are focused on majority, I mean, not majority, in fact, probably everything is secured. And especially in the gold loan, what we are hearing from all the other players who are in the gold loan, there is some stress being seen. Are we also seeing something similar in our cases, or is it something different here?

So, just to clarify, currently, our endeavor on this loan referral and our outlook out here, I would not say outlook, but our activity out here is just purely referral. Underwriting is done essentially by a partner in our current scenario. As regards to, you know, some articles which you are referring to, gold loan is under stress, etc., etc., I think we are, A, we do not underwrite, we do not know, but whatever data point which we are looking at is, and the kind of growth which we have seen in our portfolio or in our demographics, etc., does not seem to be suggest that any skepticism coming in terms of a further underwriting by the underwriters. So, I think it's too premature to comment on whether the gold loan will come under stress for us currently, but our growth plans and our geography where we are growing essentially or in our demographic which we are growing is showing a good way of growth without skepticism coming on the underwriter side.

Thank you so much, sir, for the detailed answer and all the best for us. Thank you.

Thank you. A reminder to all participants, anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchtone telephone. The next question is from the line of Manish Kumar Jain from Prudence Security. Please proceed.

Namaste, sir. Can you hear my voice?

Yes, very clearly.

Sir, we are transit on small finance bank.

So, as you rightly said, we are already in the journey of in transition into small finance bank. So, we still have time to prepare for the branches and all. We have already identified the locations, geographies, districts, and in the process of forming up the branch plan, and it should be ready by the Q4 before we apply to the RPI.

So, presently, our business, all the loan referrals and our old patent, are they coming up on it?

Right. Also, just for your information, currently also we have around 125 branches and contact service points across India, apart from our merchant network. So those will also be converted into a small finance bank branch. So in addition, we are also planning to open approximately 40 odd branches, liability branches, and around 25 to 30 asset centers in the first year of operations.

Thank you.

The next question is from the line of Hush, an individual investor. Please go ahead.

Hello, I'm audible. Yes, sir.

Yes, yes.

Okay, so I wanted to know, so we're targeting to transition around the first quarter of next year. So when we do that, we'll have, you know, 2,500 to 3,000-odd crore deposit book ready to be lent out. So, I am not asking for an exact guidance, but a rough estimate of how much, what sort of AUM are we targeting in the first year of operations? Hi.

So, you know, we had earlier also presented it across that you are right. We have an opening balance of our deposit. Most likely, it will be a number which will be much more than what you just said. But we are looking at anywhere around 2,000 crore or what kind of dispersal which will be happening across the portfolios and the secured product which we are looking at. As we grow closer to the launch date and we are testing the preparation, as I just said, the kind of our loan referral enhancement which is coming across, The number can vary as well. It can be slightly more or less depending upon what we are seeing over next three quarters in terms of our loan referral business as well. I think one point which is to be noted, and again, I'm not differing from anything which we have put earlier in our strategic map in terms of year-by-year on SFB is we want to focus on a secured portfolio and we want to leverage our current merchant channel. These are the two most important things which will give us quite a differentiation which we come across in SFP.

Okay, so the 2,000-odd crore of assets is approximately in the first 12-16 months.

Yes, please.

Okay, and my second question is something I asked previous quarter also. So as an analyst, what worries me is that we're a payment bank, and the deposits we're raising are more of like a transactional float. And I just wanted to understand, how are we planning to finance assets on a deposit book that comes and goes?

Let me take the question. So, currently, if you see, there is a constant growth in our deposit balance, and what we have also observed from that behavior, 90% of our deposits remain as a core balance, which is very critical from a lending point of view. So, they are sticky and core for us. So, 90% of our balance remains core. Currently, I mean, we don't, and larger part of 99% of these balances are savings account balances. So that itself also gives us the confidence that this will remain as a core during the AFCB transition as well.

Okay, yeah, that makes sense. And so as a payments bank, I think we can't keep deposits of above 2 lakhs, right? So how much deposits will accrue back to us the moment we transition?

That's, essentially, if I understand your question right, you are saying that once the restrictions of two lakhs go away, what is the impetus or what is the increment which we can see in the deposit growth? Is that what you are alluding towards? Yeah. So, those are the plans which we have anywhere separately published across, not in terms of numbers, but in terms of a plan that how do we want to cater this off. As we speak, currently, do we have a number that how much will be the difference coming on account of only 2 lakhs? I don't think we are targeting it that way. However, in addition to 2 lakhs, it will also be fixed deposits will be allowed, recurring deposits will be allowed. So, there are a lot of other liabilities or deposit restrictions which are currently there in payment bank, may not be there in small finance bank. That's how we are catering to an overall kind of a deposit growth which is coming across. So, maybe as we come closer towards the opening of these branches and location, you know, towards coming across is where we will maybe have some sort of impetus coming on that.

Sure. And do we intend to continue our renewal and referral businesses? Those nine items will still continue?

See, renewal will definitely continue. As I think earlier I said, of around 330, 3-odd crores of revenue, 74 crores has been renewal. So we are going to continue in terms of our renewal income coming across as well, because that's something which we built over the last six, seven years, and that catered to a specific kind of a demographic coming. As regards to referral, again, as we said, we are probably doing 250 crores of lending referral currently on a monthly basis. We will then just take a stock of how do we want to do it across. The most simplest and the most placid manner is that depending upon the kind of growth which we see it across, most of it we can underwrite it ourselves as well. So that, again, renewal, yes, referral, we'll just have to take the stock as it comes towards the beginning of the SFP.

Or maybe we can lend out on the secured side and refer on the unsecured. Is that also a possibility?

I don't think we have gone into that far. As we speak, currently, our endeavor is, you know, check the referral lending to go towards, you know, underwriting for yourself. And as I think Anup said earlier, or we put it in the invested deck as well earlier, is we are looking for larger part of our portfolio to be secured. So, you know, we will take this call, whether how do we leverage the referral more closer towards the SFP launch.

Okay, sure. Thank you. Best of luck.

Thank you very much.

Thank you. A request to all participants, please restrict your questions to three questions for participants. For more questions, please rejoin the queue. The next question is from the line of Piti Agarwal from SK Associates. Please go ahead.

Yeah, thank you so much for the opportunity. I wanted to understand that how is Fino planning to manage credit risk and collection efficiency, along with asset quality, as you plan to move towards your lending operations?

Thank you for the question. In terms of the credit risk, just to highlight, we are currently, in terms of the customer, we are looking at, we are only targeting in the initial first three years of captive consumption of the loans. That is, we are targeting our own customers and merchants, for which we have already their transaction behavior, their cash flows for three to four years, transaction history we have. That is our first target or customers for the credit underwriting. That is one. Secondly, in terms of the collection efficiency, currently, if you see, one of our business verticals is a cash management system where we currently collect around more than 6,500 crore every month. And this 60% of these collections are for the NBSCs and the banks or the MFIs in the rural India, where the EMI collections happen at our merchant points. So, we already have an infrastructure or distribution network which will utilize or leverage for our collection purposes as well.

Understood. And what is your medium-term guidance for revenue growth, EBITDA margins, and return on assets?

So, currently, I will refrain from saying any guidance for this financial year. We are trying to, as Ketan mentioned in his opening remark, that this is a year of transition. We are trying to regain our business volumes and focus on building up for the small finance bank transition. So, we will continue to invest in technology and talent. Hence, this should be treated as a year of transition for us.

Understood, sir. That's it from my side. Thank you.

Thank you. The next question is from the line of Alpal Gandhi from AG Capital. Please proceed.

Hello. Thanks for the opportunity. So, I had a couple of questions. So my first question is, with strong growth in CASA and loan referrals, what does management believe will be the biggest contributor to incremental revenue growth over the next two financial years?

So if I understood your question right, is, you know, when we become an SFP, etc., what is our biggest growth drivers? I would just tell two things out here. One One is maybe, or not maybe, but our cost of funds. Currently, we are at 1.4% of our cost of funds with an average deposit of around 2,794 or 2,800 odd crores. Our endeavor is to grow that, maintaining at least 250 to 300 basis point difference between the peer bank So, CASA and the liability-first approach will definitely be the biggest game-changer, if I can say, in terms of how do we grow across into our SFP. Someone earlier asked about renewal income as well. Renewal income broadly is around 65 to 75 crores on an average basis for each quarter which we are looking at for this year. So that's something which will continue. So CASA definitely becomes a big, big, important thing for us. Currently, as we speak, it contributes 50% plus of our total revenue. Loan referral, as I said, is a testimony of our model that whether on a merchant model, the way we are garnishing or the way we are mobilizing deposits similarly can be mobilized or the assets coming across as well. So, loan referral currently is 250 crores. It is more about testing our demographics, our model when we become an SSB and how that can become our sourcing platform along with our deposits as well. So, both are equally important. Anup earlier mentioned it off as well that in addition to all of this, our payment-related and fee-based income, which is, you know, in the range of around 1,300 odd crores or, you know, on an annualized basis, also intends to continue and that will be also a differential point for us when we become asset-lipped SFP.

Okay, understood, sir. And my next question was, what are the key business and financial milestones investors should track over the next two, three quarters to assess whether the company is successfully transitioning into its next phase of growth?

So, as mentioned earlier, we are not providing any guidance right now. We are focusing on building a strong liability franchise. So, our growth in CASA, which will be the corner store for our S&P launch, and our loan reference business, which is a testimony to say that there is a demand for credit in our target segment, which we are dealing with. So, that both will be the cornerstones for our future growth, along with the sustained fee-based income for our transaction business and other B2B businesses, which will continue even in SFB scenario.

Okay, understood. Massage from Asahi. Thank you.

Thank you. A request to all participants, please restrict your questions to two questions per participant. For more questions, please rejoin the queue. The next question is from the line of Anurag Jain, an individual investor. Please proceed.

Good afternoon, sir. My first question is related to the corporate VC business. Where are we in terms of high off sale of this business, and if there are any updates you could share?

Thank you for the question. In terms of exiting the corporate VC business, it's part of our SFB transition plan, and it will be executed as per the plan before we apply to the Reserve Bank of India.

And sir, just to understand this process, can you theoretically retain this business once you transition to a SFB, and RBI will give you certain time to exit this business, or is it a pre-conversion that you have to exit it before the conversion to SFB?

Sir, I will restrict my response to what I mentioned. It is part of our transition plan and will meet all the conditions which is stipulated by the RBI for transitioning into SFB.

Thanks, thanks. I'll move on to the next question. In the first 12 months of being there as an SFV, what kind of investment is emphasized for branches, for technology backing, and what kind of manpower hiring would be required versus the current 3,000 employees approximately?

So, in terms of the CAPEX, we had mentioned in our earlier quarter presentations sort of around, so we are anticipating a CAPEX largely on the technology front in terms of augmenting the low LOS, the lending operation system, the lending management system and other peripheral systems required, collateral management, enterprise NPA, there are various technology systems required. So we are anticipating anything between 120 to 150 crore of capex over a period of 1 year to 15 months from now in terms of transitioning into SAP, in the first year of SAP operational. And in terms, which also largely takes care of our branch, as I mentioned earlier, the branch infracross is not much. Largely the spends will be on the technology front. In terms of people hiring, we are definitely going to leverage our existing 3000 people already we have. We will be augmenting the resources in terms of hiring for our asset vertical, which will be as per our business plan once we get the final nod from the Reserve Bank of India.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you. The next question is from the line of Ankit Kanodia from Zen Levesh. Please proceed.

Thank you for allowing a follow-up. I just have one follow-up. Sir, it is in regards to your response to one of the earlier participants' question. You mentioned that you are expecting about 2,000 crore of disbursal in FY28 when we transition into SSB. But my general understanding in query is that when we are into referral and in six months we are already disbursed 1,400 crores, Don't you think 2,000 crore is a very, very, very conservative number, and we should have a much bigger target? Maybe I am missing something.

You are absolutely right. It will be the first year of operations. We want to test the guardrails which we have built, the processes we have built when we go live. Hence, we have kept a very, very low target, or maybe not conservative, but a realistic target of 2,000 crore in first 12 months of operations. As we grow along, we will be growing more, and as we have mentioned earlier in our presentation, we are looking at around 8,000 to 10,000 crore book over a period of 3 to 4 years.

Ankit, Ketan here, I think, yes, Anup rightly answered this off. The answer of this also lies in what I just said earlier. We have at least three more quarters of our lending referral going through it. So that will be also a good point of determination in terms of going relatively more aggressive, and not only in terms of numbers, but in terms of the rail guards and in terms of the sourcing as well. So some of this will evolve as we go towards the last quarter before the launch as well.

Thank you so much for the answer and all this.

Thank you. As there are no further questions from the participants, I now hand the conference over to the management for closing comments. Over to you, sir.

Thank you, everyone, for patiently listening to us in terms of our quarter two performance and H1 performance. I'll just recreate what we have attempted to say over the last 45, 50, 55 minutes. I think our strategic priorities are aligned. This is, you know, we have gone through a transition or we are going through transition. We've gone through consolidation mode as well. We will continue to invest for growth. And the priorities for us remain, you know, SFP transition, liabilities-first approach, and how do we get into, you know, further leverage our B2B and alliances business as well. This is where I just wanted to put a perspective for next couple of quarters. Thank you, everyone, for listening to us very patiently. Have a wonderful evening. Thank you.

Thank you. On behalf of Go India Advisors, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us and you may now disconnect your lines. Thank you.