Credit extended to borrowers for loans against gold jewellery rose sharply in January, coinciding with record rise in gold prices, with gold loan portfolio rising by 76.9 percent in January 2025, as compared to 17.4 percent a year ago, data from Reserve Bank of India showed on February 28, even as personal loan growth decelerated during the period.

In absolute terms, outstanding loan against gold jewellery stood at Rs 1.79 lakh crore as on January 24, 2025, as compared to Rs 1.01 lakh crore as on January 26, 2024, and Rs 86,133 crore as on January 27, 2023, last month’s data from RBI’s Sectoral Deployment of Bank Credit showed.

The statistics on sectoral deployment for January was collected from 41 scheduled commercial banks, and accounted for about 95 per cent of the total non-food credit deployed by all scheduled commercial banks.

Bank credit to loan against gold jewellery was the fastest growing in the personal loan segment, compared to other components. However, bank credit to ‘other personal loans’, ‘vehicle loans’ and ‘credit card outstanding’, have declined during the period, leading to a deceleration of personal loan growth in January 2025.

Personal loan growth has decelerated to 14.2 percent as on fortnight ended January 24, 2025, as compared with 18.2 per cent a year ago.

Bank’s credit growth in other personal loan segments fell to 8.7 percent as on fortnight ended January 24, 2025, compared with 23.1 per cent a year ago. Similarly, bank credit to education slowed down to 15.9 percent as on January 24, 2025, compared to 23.5 percent in a year ago period.

The bank credit to credit card outstanding growth stood at 13 percent as on January 24, 2025, as compared to 31.3 percent in a year ago period.

Credit to agriculture and allied activities registered a growth of 12.2 per cent on year, as on fortnight ended January 24, 2025, compared to 20 per cent for corresponding fortnight a year ago.

Credit to industry recorded a growth of 8.2 per cent as on fortnight ended January 24, 2025, compared with 7.5 per cent for the corresponding fortnight of the previous year. Among major industries, outstanding credit to ‘petroleum, coal products and nuclear fuels’, ‘basic metal and metal product’, ‘chemicals and chemical products’ and ‘all engineering’ recorded an accelerated growth, data added.

Courtesy: Money Control