State Bank of India is making an aggressive overseas push by opening 40 branches across geographies in financial year 2010 even as it expects to make smaller acquisitions in foreign shores provided they add value to its balance sheet, extend its global reach, and bring in innovative products and skill-sets.
The bank’s organic growth plans overseas include opening branches in Canada, the US, the UK, the Maldives, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Hong Kong, Indonesia, China, Bangladesh, and Nepal, as also West Asia and Africa. Currently, SBI has 132 overseas branches/offices in 32 countries.
While 75 per cent of its branch business in overseas centres will have an Indian connection, it expects at least 25 per cent of the business to come from locals. The contribution of overseas operations to its profitability will be at least 10 per cent this year as against 8 per cent last year.
SBI plans to open five more branches in the UK, taking their number in the country to 12. The business size of the bank’s UK operations is about $3 billion and has been growing at 40 per cent the last couple of years.
SBI is also planning to set up five regional hubs to control the operations of its overseas offices/ branches in five geographical locations — Europe, America, East Asia, SAARC, West Asia, and Africa. The first regional hub will be operational in London by the end of this financial year. This hub will exercise administrative control over the seven branches in the UK and one each in Frankfurt (Germany), Milan (Italy) and Paris (France).
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