HDFC Bank Is India's Top Pvt Retail Bank

HDFC Bank, the country’s second-largest private bank, has been crowned the top retail bank displacing ICICI Bank. The reason is attributed to the recovery in demand and robust economic growth during the past few months.

As per the reports, HDFC Bank has also lent more to the customers for buying homes, cars and two-wheelers. The reports say that the banking major has lent Rs 4,000 crore during the month of March alone, which is more than double of the same period last year.

The bank has also disbursed retail loans of Rs 1,800 crore, and Rs 3,000 crore in April and October respectively. It had disbursed Rs 2,700 crore loans in June 2008.

The bank did a notable job in the time when others are applying controls on the lending to the retail sector. However, the bank had more bad loans last fiscal due to global meltdown.

“This has been the best ever month for us. In March itself, we disbursed retail loans of Rs 4,000 crore and this comes on the back of January and February where the average disbursements were at around Rs 3,500 each. Each of our business in the retail side is profitable and we have shown the highest-ever profit in the retail asset business,” said Pralay Mondal, country head of retail assets & credit cards, HDFC Bank.

According to reports, ICICI Bank, India’s largest private bank, had disbursed home loans of about Rs 700 crore, auto loans of Rs 300 crore and commercial vehicle loans of Rs 200 crore. It had also disbursed property loans of about Rs 150 crore.

The bank however got out of track after 2008-09. It is now focusing on secured loans. It has also trimmed down the number of credit cards from a peak of 8.5 million units to about 5 million now.