New Delhi, March 30 -- The stock of mortgage lender Bajaj Housing Finance Ltd hit a new 52-week low of Rs.75 on Friday. It is now just 9% higher than its public issue price of Rs.70 in September 2024. The issue was oversubscribed by about 64x of its offer size driven by huge investor appetite, with chairman Sanjiv Bajaj seeing the company as the contender for becoming the "next HDFC".

The post-listing frenzy pushed it to a peak of Rs.188.5 on 18 September 2024. But since then, its fortune has drastically reversed. Has Bajaj Housing Finance become a case of stock mispricing due to misplaced expectations?

Mispricing can be understood through two valuation comparisons: with HDFC and with its listed peers.

HDFC, before its merger with HDFC...