UOB to kickstart India operations

Close on the heels of the meeting of Monetary Authority of Singapore with the Reserve Bank of India, United Overseas Bank (UOB) has decided to come to India and explore opportunities under the Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement ( CECA) signed between India and Singapore.

UOB was one of the banks which featured in the list of the three banks that will be offered special banking status in India under CECA while the other two were Development Bank of Singapore and Overseas Chinese Corporation. DBS is already in operation in India while OCBC has winded up last year.

According to banking sources, UOB will be hold talks with the RBI this week about its plans for the Indian market and then apply for license to operate. Under CECA, national status and 15 bank branch licenses will be offered to these three banks.

The other foreign banks in talks with RBI are the National Bank of Australia and Dresdner . According to banking sources, Allianz, which now holds a majority stake in Dresdner is in talks with RBI for exploring the opportunity. Dresdner had winded up its operations from India few years back.

UOB is a leading bank in Singapore and a dominant player in the Asia-Pacific. As on December 2004, the UOB Group had total assets of S$134.9 billion(Singapore dollar) and shareholders' funds of S$13.4 billion. It also achieved a record net profit after tax of S$1.5 billion in 2004 and its ROE (excluding goodwill amortisation) stood at 12.4 per cent.

UOB has a vast network of 385 offices around the world comprising 61 branches in Singapore and over 380 offices in Australia, Brunei, Canada, China, France, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, United Kingdom, USA and Vietnam.

The monetary authority discussed the outline of the cooperation in the banking sector between India and Singapore. Under CECA, the Reserve Bank of India has specified that three Singapore banks will be granted licenses to set up 15 branches in a period of four years.

The three banks are also allowed to open wholly owned subsidiaries. In turn, Singapore government will grant permission to four Indian banks to start wholesale banking operations. This will be in addition to granting qualified full branch status to three Indian banks.

The banks that might get the licenses are State Bank of India, ICICI Bank, Bank of Baroda, and Bank of India. Banking sources added that two Indian banks - Uco bank and Indian overseas bank are already operating under qualified full branch license.

With qualified full branch license, the Indian banks will be permitted to carry on domestic operations in Singapore including operating ATM network .