Merrill says to expand private banking in India

SINGAPORE, Mar 8 (Reuters) Merrill Lynch's private bank in India will expand to cover at least 10 cities in the next three years, from five cities now, to take advantage of the country's rising affluence, an executive said on Thursday.

''We are serious in building the business outside of the U.S. and Asia is a key growth area for us,'' Rahul Malhotra, head of Merrill's Indian private client business, told Reuters in an interview.

''Within that, India is a very key focus area for us.'' India has some 83,000 millionaires, worth a combined US0 billion, according to the Merrill Lynch Capgemini 2006 Asia-Pacific Wealth Report, and is the second-fastest growing market in the world after South Korea.

Some of the biggest names in the wealth-management business, such as Citigroup and Merrill, are stepping up their private banking operations in India, where the market is estimated at around 0 billion.

Last month, Citigroup told Reuters that it plans to triple the number of private banking offices in India, and double the number of bankers dealing with wealthy non-resident and resident Indians by the end of 2008.

Malhotra did not say how many private bankers Merrill has at present handling resident and non-resident Indian clients.

''Clearly in three years, we will have presence in more than twice the number of cities and we would have more than roughly three to four times the number of branches,'' said Malhotra, who joined Merrill from Citigroup last year.

Merrill has offices in Mumbai, New Delhi, Chennai, Bangalore and Kolkata, and operates in teh country as DSP Merrill Lynch Ltd., a 90 percent-10 percent joint venture between Merrill and brokerage firm DSP Financial Consultants.

REUTERS CS DS1550