Indiabulls Housing Finance has repaid Rs 2,232 crore of external commercial borrowings (ECBs) raised in 2018 from Barclays, Japan's MUFG and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp, Taiwan's CTBC and Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ), bringing to an end a deleveraging process the company started after IL&FS had foundered in 2018.
The company has repaid all of its $3 billion foreign currency borrowings availed of in the last few years and will now shift focus to growing its assets under management (AUM).
The debt repayments are now merely Rs 400 - 700 crore a month. This will be covered by repayment from the loan portfolio. At the end of this quarter, the company borrowings will be down to about Rs 36,000 crore and net debt to equity will be only 1.8 times.
In all, since the IL&FS fall in September 2018, the company has repaid Rs 85,512 crore on a net basis, halving its balance sheet to Rs74,413 crore from Rs1.39 lakh crore at the end of September 2018.
With the deleveraging now complete the company will now focus on growth with excess collections of about ?1,200 crore to ?1,600 crore a quarter now available for asset growth.
By the end of this financial year, Indiabulls Housing Finance is looking to double disbursals to Rs1,200 crore per month primarily focused on affordable and green housing. From the third quarter the company will start posting steady AUM growth and is on track to get to mid-teen return on equity by FY26.
However, the company will pursue the so-called asset light model depending on its partnership with its eight banking partners under the co-lending model in which it will keep only 20% of loans originated on its books.
Out of its total AUM of Rs 70,000 crore currently, about Rs 50,000 crore are loans on its own book. The company expects to keep about 35% of loans on its own book.