![JMA – Ninja & Deep Jandu [Official MV] Kaptaan](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/-dsfIh319s0/maxresdefault.jpg "JMA – Ninja & Deep Jandu [Official MV] Kaptaan")
State-owned lenders hold a dominant 60 per cent market share in the business, while gold-loan focused NBFCs (non banking finance companies) hold an 8.1 per cent share of the portfolio outstanding.
Illustration: Dominic Xavier/Rediff
The gold loan portfolio across the system has nearly doubled to Rs 15.6 lakh crore in two years to November 2025, as a spike in prices of the precious commodity encouraged lenders to increase their exposures to the safer segment, a report said on Wednesday.
There was a 42 per cent spike in lending against gold in the year to November 2025, on top of the 39 per cent growth in the year to November 2024, which led the portfolio to nearly double to Rs 15.6 lakh crore from Rs 7.9 lakh crore in November 2023.
The increased comfort in lending against gold has also pushed up the share of gold loans in the overall retail borrowing portfolio to 9.7 per cent at the end of November from 8.1 per cent a year back, the report by a credit information company said.
Crif High Mark said the portfolios are growing, driven by rising gold prices and strong collateral, and explained that the price surge in gold prices has lifted loan eligibility for borrowers.
The number of active loans grew by just 10.3 per cent, and the loans above Rs 2.5 lakh constitute nearly half of the book as of November 2025, up from 36.4 per cent in March 2023, Crif High Mark said.
Over 56 per cent of the gold loans are taken by male borrowers, even as the female borrowers display better repayment behaviour.
The fast-paced lending has led to a situation where the origination volumes and values of FY25 have surpassed within the first eight months of FY26 itself, the company said.
State-owned lenders hold a dominant 60 per cent market share in the business, while gold-loan focused NBFCs (non banking finance companies) hold an 8.1 per cent share of the portfolio outstanding.
From an asset quality perspective, the report said there was an improvement in repayments, and the portfolio in stress has reduced across all overdue buckets in the year to November 2025.
The gold loans portfolio demonstrates “one of the lowest delinquency levels” among all retail loans categories, it said.
From a regional distribution perspective, the report said, three-fourths of the portfolio is concentrated in the southern states, and the top-10 states have over 90 per cent of the outstanding.
Gujarat led the portfolio growth at 67 per cent in the year to November 2025, it said, adding that Karnataka and Maharashtra follow with over 50 per cent growth.
On the stress building front, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Odisha lead with a higher proportion of unpaid loans.
