Credit cards: HDFC Bank aims to regain lost market share in 1 year

HDFC Bank is looking at winning back the market share by number of cards in the next one year, a senior official said on Monday.

The private sector lender was allowed to issue new credit cards by the RBI last week, over eight months after being banned from doing so due to concerns over repeated technological outages.

Parag Rao, group head for payments and consumer finance, digital banking and IT said that the bank has set some milestones for itself as it seeks to re-enter the market.

The first is to achieve monthly new credit card sales to 3 lakh, the number right before the ban in November 2020, Rao said.

Two quarters after that, the bank aims to take the monthly new card sales to 5 lakh a month, Rao said. The lender plans to regain the market share by number of cards.

After the lifting of the ban, HDFC Bank had spoken about coming back with a bang. Rao said spends on credit cards are 60% higher in April-June quarter on its card portfolio.

The bank will depend on its internal set of customers to grow the number of cards and is also looking at partnering with key players like Paytm announced earlier in the day, to increase its sourcing.