ICICI Bank, the biggest private lender of India, is open to buying loan portfolios of European banks, its chief executive said.
“The opportunity to pick up some good assets at good pricing clearly exists. So, that’s what we are looking at all the time and exercising it whenever we see the right opportunity,” Chanda Kochhar told the Reuters India Investment Summit on Wednesday.
From in.finance.yahoo.com:
European banks are struggling to raise their capital cushions to become more resilient against future shocks, which they can do by increasing equity they hold or by shrinking their asset base.
The European Banking Authority has said banks need more than 100 billion euros of new capital, but the International Monetary Fund warned in September EU banks faced possible losses of 300 billion euros as a result of sovereign and interbank lending risks.
Kochhar, who was ranked fifth in Fortune’s 50 most powerful women in business, ruled out the acquisition of any European bank.
“We have picked up some which are India-related assets, but I would say not very large number, because given the fact that on the other hand the ability to raise funds currently has also become more expensive,” she said.
