RBL Bank eyes to open 226 new branches in 3 years

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RBL Bank is planning to add 226 branches in the next three years in a bid to grow its total business (deposits plus advances) to ₹2.70-lakh crore, or thereabouts from ₹1,55,096 crore as at March-end 2023.

By expanding the branch network to 740 by March-end 2026 from 514 as at March-end 2023, the private sector lender will have a footprint in 24 States (20 States as at March-end 2023), 190 districts (142) and four Union Territories (3).

By March-end 2023, the bank is eyeing 1.71 times growth in deposits to about ₹1.45 lakh crore (from ₹84,887 crore as at March-end 2023) and 1.78 times growth in advances to about ₹1.25 lakh crore (₹70,209 crore), as per the bank’s investor presentation.

The Bank expects the wholesale to retail advances mix to change from 46:54 as at March-end 2023 to about 35:65.

Vision ahead

The proportion of credit cards and “housing plus business” loans of total advances will go up from 24 per cent and 16 per cent, respectively, as at March-end 2023 to about 25 per cent each. Microfinance portfolio is expected to grow to about 10 per cent (from 8 per cent). The balance will comprise vehicle loans, agri plus gold loans, and other retail loans.

The bank emphasised that it will maintain its market positioning in credit cards and microfinance. The thrust on growing credit cards portfolio comes even as the Reserve Bank of India has increased risk weight on banks’ exposure to this segment by 25 percentage points in the wake of concerns on high growth in certain components of consumer credit.

The bank aims to build on existing “core” businesses (corporate and institutional banking, commercial banking, credit cards, microfinance, business loans and housing loans) and the scale in nascent verticals (rural vehicle loans, agri and gold loans, and other retail loans).

By establishing semi-urban/rural presence across multiple products, the lender said it is pursuing a branch-led growth model, leading to granularisation of assets and liabilities.

Its strategy is to grow small format branches so that opex (operating expenses) are low.