India's third most valuable bank, HDFC Bank, and RAKBank together expect to nearly treble business from non-resident Indians helped by a new relationship they have forged and a range of financial products they are jointly offering, HDFC Bank's chief executive said.
HDFC, one of two Indian banks listed on the New York Stock Exchange, also plans to apply for a branch license in the UAE and is interested in acquiring a bank in the Middle East, Aditya Puri said in an interview.
He said HDFC Bank's relationship with RAKBank allowed Indians in the UAE with small savings to access a range of investment products including shares, debt, mutual funds and insurance from their local RAKBank branch. The offering is possible as HDFC owns a brokerage, has a relationship with all Indian mutual funds and the group majority-owns a life insurance company. It would have representatives in each RAKBank branch to help customers with the service.
HDFC would also offer financial advisory services to all account holders without any minimum balance stipulations that allowed them to structure their portfolios and alert them to price changes, he said.
"RAKBank is getting some 10 per cent of the mortgage market and they are getting 10 per cent of the new customers. So we are saying that together we should be able to get more than that," Puri said. "We are targeting between 10-30 per cent in a very short span of time."
He said India was a great place to invest and offered returns of at least six per cent from debt funds, up to 10 per cent annually over three years from equity funds apart from an appreciating currency.
"Do I want a bank in the UAE, the answer is yes ... and we would put in an application but there is such a long queue," he said.
Gulf News
