BoB links home loan product to RBI’s repo rate

Bank of Baroda (BoB) announced a new home loan product linked to the Reserve Bank of India’s repo rate. In doing so, BoB has gone the State Bank of India way. Following the latest Monetary Policy Committee decision to cut rates by 35 basis points (bps), several state-run banks, including Union Bank of India, Allahabad Bank, Bank of India and Syndicate Bank, have expressed their intention to launch loan products linked to an external benchmark, which in most cases so far has been the repo rate. For the time being, the new products are largely restricted to home and auto loans.

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Bank of Baroda customers opting for the home loan product would have a choice between MCLR-linked rate — indexed to the bank’s cost of funds — or a rate linked to RBI’s repo rate.

The marginal cost of funds based lending Rate (MCLR)-linked product starts at 8.45 per cent. Meanwhile, home loans availed at repo rate-linked interest rate start at 8.35 per cent, passing on a further benefit of 10 bps to the current MCLR-rated pricing.

Union Bank of India, which had held its asset liability committee meeting on Friday, said in order to facilitate better interest rate transmission, it would soon link its housing and vehicle loan portfolio to the repo rate.

Transmission of monetary policy has been a sticky point between banks and the Reserve Bank of India.

Despite a cumulative 75 bps cut in the repo rate between February and June this year, banks across the country have reduced their weighted average lending rates on fresh rupee loans by a mere 29 bps during the same period, Reserve Bank governor Shaktikanta Das had said last week.

About SBI:

Headquarters: Mumbai, Maharashtra

Chairman: Rajnish Kumar

About Bank of Baroda

Headquarters: Alkapuri, VadodaraCEO: P. S. Jayakumar