Indians are not able to shop like they used to and worry that they won’t be able to repay the loans they took to shop before the lockdown.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Bajaj Finance, a lender whose mainstay business is to make Indians spend more through convenient equated monthly instalments (EMI), has suffered immensely.
In a call with analysts on Monday, Bajaj Finance said it lost 350,000 customers and its asset under management (AUM) eroded by ₹4,750 crore (3.2%) during the lockdown.
The blow of the lockdown in March meant that AUM growth is reduced to 27% on a year-on-year basis for the fourth quarter. Compare this with the 53% y-o-y growth in the December quarter, the starkness is unmistakable.