UCO Bank looking at Rs six-crore business by FY16

Mumbai, Jul 13: Public sector lender UCO Bank today (Jul 13) said it is eyeing to more than double its total business to Rs six lakh crore by FY16 through customer acquisition and network expansion.

The bank's total business stands at Rs 2.45 lakh crore as of March''11, and the Kolkata-based bank wants to take this to Rs 3.5 crore by March 2013 and Rs 6 lakh crore by March 2016, its field General Manager RK Agrawal said here.

It is also targeting to raise the number of branches to 4,000 by March 2016 from 2,239 now and the automated teller machines to 5,000 from the current 681, he added.

Over the next five years, the bank is targeting to increase the number of account holders to 4.8 crore from the present 1.40 crore.

Thrust will also be on overseas branches, Agrawal said, but refused to give more details. At present, the bank has two branches each in Hong Kong and Singapore and has a representative office each in Malaysia and mainland China, Agarwal said.

In its drive to raise low-cost current and savings account (CASA) deposits, the bank has joined its peer IDBI Bank and waived charges on a slew of transactions like making demand drafts, payment orders, fund transfers etc.

UCO Bank expects its CASA ratio to move up to 35 percent from 24 percent through the special drive christened "total freedom", Agrawal said.

The waiver will be operational for 174 days from July 11 to December 31 this year and the bank is targeting to open 25 lakh accounts as part of the drive, he added.

State-run IDBI Bank, which was also plagued with the problem of low CASA ratio, had launched a similar scheme last September which saw its CASA ratio moving up.

The CASA ratio of banks like UCO Bank get dwarfed compared to other public sector banks like the State Bank whose CASA deposits are around 50 percent which helps in profitability.

PTI