MUMBAI: The shares of State Bank of India (SBI) surged 7% to a lifetime intraday high of Rs 1,141 on Monday after the lender reported its highest-ever quarterly profit for the December quarter, beating Street expectations. The rally lifted SBI’s market capitalization beyond Rs 10 trillion, making it only the sixth Indian company to cross this milestone. Following the strong earnings performance, several brokerages raised their price targets for the stock.
The bank's management has also raised loan growth guidance for FY26 to 13-15% from the earlier 12-14% as the bank has seen a sharp uptick in the corporate credit which rose close to 14% in the quarter. The nation’s largest lender had Saturday reported a strong 24.49% jump in net income at Rs 21,028.15 crore. This is the highest-ever quarterly net income reported by the banking behemoth whose business crossed Rs 103 trillion.
With Rs 10,50,900 crore in market cap, SBI becomes sixth domestic company to cross the Rs 10-trillion-mcap-milestone, making it the fifth most-valued firm. Still this is close to 60% lower than HDFC Bank’s Rs 15.982 trillion mcap, which is the second most valued company after Reliance which has the highest valuation of Rs 19.80 trillion. Bharti Airtel comes third with Rs 12.47 trillion, TCS at fourth with Rs 10.675 trillion, and ICICI Bank at Rs 10.08 trillion.
If the price rally continues SBI can overtake TCS easily as it is already at a spitting distance from the fourth position. The stock was at a 52-week low of Rs 679.65 in March 2025 and has since then made a dramatic recovery.
The bank’s net interest income grew 9% to Rs 45,190 crore during the quarter under review from Rs 41,445 crore in the year-ago period, reflecting steady growth in core lending income. On the asset quality front, asset quality improved with NPAs falling to a two decadal low, the chairman CS Setty had said. While gross NPA ratio improved to 1.57 from 2.07 a year ago, net NPA ratio declined to 0.39 from 0.54. Provisions for the quarter stood at Rs 4,506 crore, lower than Rs 5,400 crore in the previous quarter and sharply down from Rs 911 crore a year earlier, indicating easing credit costs.
Meanwhile brokerages have given strong buy calls on SBI with Rs 1,250 to Rs 1,300 as target prices.
While Nomura has a ‘buy’ call with target price of Rs 1,235 or an upside potential of nearly 16%; CLSA has an ‘outperform’ rating on the stock, with target of Rs 1,275 or 20% over the previous closing, Citi’s target is Rs 1,265 or an upside of nearly 19%; Jefferies has raised its target price to Rs 1,300 implying an upside of 22%; Nuvama has raised its target price to Rs 1,250.