Mumbai, June 22 -- India's largest lender, State Bank of India (SBI), is "seriously considering" securitizing part of its home loan portfolio, chairman C.S. Setty said in an interview with Mint, as the bank prepares to diversify its funding sources beyond deposits to boost lending.

Setty did not disclose what portion of its nearly Rs.10 trillion home loan book the bank may put up for securitization, which involves pooling of assets and selling securities backed by them.

As with other banks, SBI also has "quite a lot of illiquid assets" on its balance sheet, the chairman said. "In our case, we have a Rs.10 trillion mortgage book. So how do I monetize that? We are seriously considering how to bring mortgage-backed securities to market and...