The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Wednesday more than doubled the limits in place on urban and rural cooperative banks for doling out residential home loans, citing an increase in housing prices. The RBI also permitted urban cooperative banks to offer doorstep services.

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The announcements gave a boost to real estate stocks such as DLF, Godrej Properties, Sobha, Lodha, and Oberoi.

"The RBI's move will help cooperative banks give more housing loans. We continue with our 'buy' call on Sobha and Oberoi Realty," Yash Gupta, equity research analyst at Angel One, told CNBCTV18.com.

The RBI also proposed to permit rural cooperative banks to extend finance to commercial real estate-residential housing projects within the existing limit of 5 percent of total assets.

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A majority of stocks in interest rate-sensitive pockets such as real estate and financial services rose after RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das announced the Monetary Policy Committee's unanimous decision to raise the repo rate — the key rate at which it lends money to commercial banks — by 50 basis points, on top of a surprise 40-bps hike on May 4.

The Nifty Realty — which tracks 10 stocks, including Indiabulls Real Estate, Phenix, Suntech, Prestige and Brigade — rose as much as 2.6 percent after RBI announcements.

"Cooperative banks have their importance in the last mile connectivity of our large and highly diversified population group. Enhancing the outdated limit is expected to boost growth in these banks," said Ashutosh Mishra, head of research, Institutional Equity at Ashika Group.

The moves will support book growth and profitability for urban cooperative banks as they will be able to cater to a wider set of customers, said Aashay Choksey, Assistant Vice President-Financial Sector Ratings at ICRA.

They may increase competitive intensity in micro markets where urban cooperative banks operate alongside scheduled banks and non-banking financial companies, he said.

"Growth in urban cooperative banks has lagged that in scheduled commercial banks in the past years, which is reflected in the low credit-to-deposit ratio," he said.

The latest RBI action is viewed to give a fillip to property developers, it is likely to increase competition for lenders — which are already stepping up efforts to counter fintech-led disruptions.

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First Published:Jun 8, 2022 11:56 AM IST