HDFC Bank Limited is an Indian banking and financial services company headquartered in Mumbai. It is India’s largest private sector bank by assets and the world’s 10th largest bank by market capitalization as of April 2021. It is the third-largest company by market capitalization of $122.50 billion on the Indian stock exchanges. It is also the fifteenth largest employer in India with nearly 120,000 employees
HDFC Bank was incorporated in 1994 as a subsidiary of the Housing Development Finance Corporation, with its registered office in Mumbai, Maharashtra, India. Its first corporate office and a full-service branch at Sandoz House, Worli were inaugurated by the then Union Finance Minister, Manmohan Singh.
As of 30 June 2019, the bank’s distribution network was at 5,500 branches across 2,764 cities. It has installed 430,000 POS terminals and issued 23,570,000 debit cards and 12 million credit cards in FY 2017. It has a base of 1,16,971 permanent employees as of 21 March 2020
Products and services
HDFC Bank provides a number of products and services including wholesale banking, retail banking, treasury, auto loans, two-wheeler loans, personal loans, loans against property, consumer durable loans, lifestyle loans, and credit cards. Along with this, various digital products are Payz app and Smart BUY.
Mergers and acquisitions
HDFC Bank merged with Times Bank in February 2000. This was the first merger of two private banks in the New Generation private sector banks category. Times Bank was established by Bennett, Coleman, and Co. Ltd., commonly known as The Times Group, India’s largest media conglomerate.
In 2008, Centurion Bank of Punjab (CBoP) was acquired by HDFC Bank. HDFC Bank’s board approved the acquisition of CBoP for ₹95.1 billion in one of the largest mergers in the financial sector in India.
In 2021, the bank acquired a 9.99% stake in FERBINE, an entity promoted by Tata Group, to operate a Pan-India umbrella entity for retail payment systems, similar to the National Payments Corporation of India.
Investments
In March 2020, Housing Development Finance Corporation, parent company of HDFC Bank, made an investment of ₹1,000 crores in Yes Bank. As per the scheme of reconstruction of Yes Bank, 75% of the total investment by the corporation would be locked in for three years. On 14 March, Yes Bank allotted 100 crore shares of the face value of ₹2 each for consideration of ₹10 per share (including ₹8 premium) to the Corporation, aggregating to 7.97 percent of the post issue equity share capital of Yes bank.
