Mumbai: A day after its bigger rival ICICI Bank cut its lending rate, the third-largest private lender, Axis Bank, Friday lowered its base rate by 0.10 percent to 9.85 percent, effective June 30.
The Shikha Sharma-led bank has cut its base rate, or the minimum lending rate, by 0.10 percent to 9.85 percent, a bank spokesman said.
With this, the bank has passed on a 0.30 percent reduction to borrowers this fiscal as against the 0.75 percent repo rate cut by RBI since January.
Still, the base rate is higher than the 9.7 percent offered by ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and the State Bank of India.
SBI was the first off the block to lower its base rate earlier this month after RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan in the policy meet on June 2 asked banks to pass on the benefit to consumers.
SBI had slashed its base rate by 15 basis points to 9.7 percent. HDFC Bank followed suit last week with a 0.15 percent cut to 9.7 percent.
Similarly, ICICI Bank brought down its rate by a marginal 0.05 percent yesterday.
The mid-sized Allahabad Bank too has queued up, reducing its base rate by 0.3 per cent to 9.95 percent.
Meanwhile, Kotak Mahindra Bank has hinted at base rate easing.
