A new small finance bank starts operations, check details

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Mumbai: Shivalik Small Finance Bank, which started its operations on April 26, is targeting a business of Rs 6,000 crore over the next four years against Rs 2,000 crore currently, a top official of the bank said.

In January 2020, the Uttar Pradesh-based urban cooperative bank had received in-principle approval from the Reserve Bank of India for transition into a small finance bank.

The RBI, in a release issued on April 26, said the bank has commenced operations as a small finance bank.

“We are at Rs 2,000 crore of total business (at present) and in the next 12 months, we are looking to increase the business by about Rs 1,000 crore. In the next four years, we are looking to triple our business to about Rs 6,000 crore,” Shivalik Small Finance Bank’s Managing Director and CEO Suveer Kumar Gupta said.

As of end March 31, 2021, its advances stood at Rs 805 crore and deposits at Rs 1,245 crore.

The lender currently has 31 branches, 57 ATMs and 4 banking correspondent centres.

It is planning to add about 40 touch points in the next 12 months and 1,000 touch points in the next 4-5 years.

The lender is the first urban cooperative bank to make a transition into a SFB under the RBI’s ‘Scheme on voluntary transition of Urban Co-operative Bank into a Small Finance Bank’.

The bank’s loan portfolio consists majorly of retail loans, which includes loans to MSMEs, retail businesses and individual loans such as housing, asset purchase and agriculture, gold loans and microfinance loans.

“We will continue to have special focus on loans to small businesses, microfinance agriculture and gold loans, in future,” Gupta said.

On the deposit side, the bank will focus on garnering deposits from government offices and institutions, going ahead, he said.

Gupta said the bank is also looking at maximising the digital offerings to its customers through tie-ups with fintech players.

Currently, it has a customer base of 4.5 lakh.