?Credit card spending rebounded strongly to INR 2.01 L Cr in Mar’25, recovering from Feb’25's eight-month low mainly due to year-end financial activities and heightened sales during the festive season in March.
In Mar'25, India's digital retail transactions reached INR 94.3T, showing a significant increase of 25.8% from Feb'25 (INR 74.9T) and a 14.7% growth compared to Mar'24 (INR 82.2T). NEFT continued to dominate the payment landscape, accounting for 51.5% of all non-cash retail transaction value, up from 47.2% in Feb'25. Other payment modes like UPI (26.3%), CTS (7.0%), and IMPS (7.1%) maintained their positions in the digital payment ecosystem, collectively representing India's accelerating transition to digital financial transactions
In March ’25, India's UPI processed 18.3B transactions, averaging approximately 590M transactions per day. This represents an increase of ~14% from February’s 16.1B transactions. The total transaction value for March ’25 was INR 24.7T, up from INR 21.9T in February ’25. UPI transactions showed a 36% Year-over-Year increase in volume and a 25% rise in value compared to March ’24.
The Indian government and regulators are evaluating the implementation of a Merchant Discount Rate (MDR) of 0.2% to 0.3% on large merchant UPI transactions. This move aims to encourage investment in the payments ecosystem and promote the growth of UPI.
Bank credit grew by 11.0% from Mar'24 to Mar'25, a significant slowdown from the 20.2% growth seen in the previous year. This moderation pattern is consistent across multiple sectors, indicating a broader cooling in credit expansion.
Credit to the industrial sector maintained relatively stable growth at 7.8% Y-o-Y in Mar'25, only slightly below the 8.5% recorded a year earlier. Within this sector, micro and small enterprises showed improved momentum with 9.0% growth, outpacing the overall industrial credit expansion.
Loans against gold jewellery witnessed dramatic growth of 103.5% Y-o-Y in Mar'25, more than doubling from INR 1.02L Cr to INR 2.08L Cr. Households are increasingly monetizing their gold assets during financial stress, while banks favour these fully secured loans amid uncertain economic conditions
India's consumer credit market demonstrates robust expansion, growing 11.6% year-over-year to reach INR 59.5T in March 2025. Education loans lead with the highest growth rate (15.1%), followed by personal loans and gold loans (14.3%), while housing loans (10.7%) and vehicle loans (10.6%) show strong performance. Only consumer durables financing contracted (-1.3%), suggesting shifting consumer priorities or inflation impacts on discretionary purchases.
The credit portfolio remains dominated by housing loans at 51%, reflecting the continuing importance of real estate in Indian household assets. The expansion across most lending categories points to healthy consumer confidence and financial inclusion, though the credit portfolio shows Indians prioritize long-term investments in education and housing over consumer durables