BOB to enhance overseas presence significantly

Bangalore, Nov 18: India's true global bank, Bank of Baroda is all set to spread its wings further overseas sitting pretty with ten fresh licences from the Reserve Bank of India and more in pipeline and would raise a fresh Rs.1000 crore tier two capital in a couple of months.

Bank Chairman and Managing Director Anil K Khandelwal told newsmen here today that the presence in the new countries would be completed over the next couple of years after receipt of licence from the host countries.

The Bank would open a subsidiary in Trinidad and Tobago very shortly, He said adding that licences for setting up branches in New Zealand, Canada, Australia, Qatar, Bahrain, Ghana, Male, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh have been received from RBI. The Bank also planned to open its branches in Kuwait so that it could have its presence in all gulf countries, he added.

Deriving 18 per cent of its turnover and 35 per cent of net profit from the overseas operations, Bank of Baroda will celebrate its golden jubilee of its network in London in February next year in the presence of Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram he added.

The bank would enhance its representative office in China and a second branch in Johannesburg.

Referring to fresh capital, he said the bank had been maintaining its Capital Adequacy Ratio at 12 per cent and after raising Rs.920 crore tier two capital early this year, it would go in for and round of upper tier two capital for Rs.1000 crore in a couple of months.

Mr Khandelwal said that the Bank aimed to significantly improve its presence in South India. The existing network of 265 branches in the region would be augmented to 300 in a year's time. Next year Karnataka would have ten more new branches he said adding four of them would be opened within the next three months. Referring to the success of the retail loan factory, he said the Bank had already opened a similar retail factory for small and medium enterprises in Pune. The next two factories would be opened in Chennai and Thiruppur in Tamil Nadu, he added.

He said the Bank over the last 18 months had grown by 50 per cent to take its total turnover to Rs.180,000 crore by September this year. It aimed to maintain a 30 per cent growth this year he added.

UNI