Rajiv Anand, Executive Director and Head of Retail, Axis Bank
Axis Bank’s plan to expand its branch network is aimed at attracting more deposits, Rajiv Anand, deputy managing director at Axis Bank, said on Friday.
During the last quarter of the 2023-2024 financial year, the bank added 125 branches, meaning a total of 475 new branches for the financial year. This expansion expanded the domestic distribution network to 5,377 branches.
“We are working on deposits by expanding our branches and thanks to the Citibank acquisition, we have payroll accounts that will be useful,” he said.
Axis Bank completed the acquisition of Citibank India’s consumer banking business with effect from March 1, 2023.
Anand said the acquisition of Citibank’s consumer businesses has helped India mobilize deposits due to increased number of salary accounts.
Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das, in his June 7 monetary policy statement, had urged banks to revise their business plans to address the persistent disparity between credit and deposit growth. This gap poses challenges in managing liquidity, repricing and rollover risks.
“The persistent gap between loan and deposit growth rates warrants a rethink by banks’ boards to reassess their business plans. A prudent balance between assets and liabilities must be maintained,” Das said in his statement.
According to the latest RBI data, banks’ deposit growth stood at 12.2 per cent on an annual basis till May 31, while credit growth stood at 16.1 per cent. The figures exclude the impact of the merger of HDFC with HDFC Bank.
First print: June 14, 2024 | 5:35 PM IST