Canara Bank On Expansion Mode Amid Deposit Mobilisation Challenges, Says CEO

Canara Bank chief executive and managing director K Satyanarayana Raju on Saturday said here that the bank is concentrating on expanding its business by launching new branches as deposit mobilisation has become a challenge in India nowadays.

The chief executive noted that the bank launched 150 branches in fiscal 2024 and is in the process of opening another 250 in financial year 2025.

"Because deposit mobilisation has become a big challenge for bankers nowadays in India, we have started now expanding the branches regularly," Raju told PTI on the sidelines of inaugurating a regional office in West Godavari district headquarters Bhimavaram.

He said during the merger of Syndicate Bank with Canara Bank in 2020, as many as 1,300 branches of eithers lenders were shut down.

In the Telugu states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, the chief executive officer said 22 new branches will be opened in the current fiscal.

Out of the bank's total business of Rs 23 lakh crore, he said the Telugu states with 2,000 touch points of branches, ATMs and cash recyclers account for Rs 2.2 lakh crore worth business.

Further, Raju said Canara Bank is one of the strongest public sector banks, which is not seeing signs of stake dilution from the government at this moment.

According to Raju, the government's stake in the Bengaluru-headquartered bank has come down to 63%.

However, the CEO said the bank will divest stake in its subsidiaries Canara Robeco Mutual Fund and Canara HSBC Life Insurance Company to list them in fourth quarter of current financial year and in fiscal 2025-26 respectively.

"We are also thinking of disinvestment and listing of two of our popular subsidiaries - Canara HSBC Life Insurance Company and Canara Robeco Mutual Fund. That also will give us a capital cushion," said Raj

The stake divestment in the subsidiaries will be partial, he said, adding that promoters have to sell 25% stake to be eligible for listing.

Exuding confidence in the bank's performance, Raju said the lender gave a double-digit growth guidance, minimum 10 percent growth, to investors and the public in the current fiscal in total business.

According to the CEO, Canara Bank does not compromise on its fundamentals which aims to perform consistently and noted that it is already giving 21 per cent return on equity while the globally acceptable metric is 15%.

Further, Raju highlighted that the bank is implementing Artificial Intelligence, business analytics and Machine Learning in its day-to-day business.

Observing that these technologies are enabling effective control and monitoring of operations, he said AI, ML and business analytics are generating early warning signals to centrally monitor every account.

Raju said the bank has created a cyber security wing on which it invested Rs 70 crore. Likewise, he observed that accounts exhibiting suspicious patterns of transaction for five times will be automatically blocked.

"So, we can catch hold and stop that damage in the initial stages. That is the reason our recoveries are better than our slippages. The quality of underwriting standards have improved," he said.

Emphasising that initiatives like this are improving the banks' decision- making process, Raju said they have also contributed to generate consistency in net profit and operating profit.