Scrapping its retail banking plans, French major, BNP Paribas now plans to set up a non-banking financial company (NBFC) in India.
“We plan to open up a NBFC in India, focussing on designing products for capital market clients. This will be managed and controlled religiously by a dedicated team,” said Frederic Amoudru, chief executive and country manager with BNP Paribas.
The foreign bank plans to apply to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for a NBFC license before March 2008, the head said.
“We will apply to the RBI soon. We will take a call later if the NBFC would be a deposit-taking or a non-deposit taking one, but would prefer having a non-deposit taking NBFC,” Amoudru added.
Last year there were talks about the bank planning to venture into retail banking business in India. However, this is not happening anymore.
“There are enough challenges at the moment, which we continue to evaluate. We are not planning to venture into retail banking in India, for the moment,” Amoudru said.
The bank has also decided to adopt a wait-and-watch approach to raise further capital. “We are monitoring the markets closely to raise further capital. By next year, if markets recover, then we will go ahead and raise capital,” Amoudru said.
Amoudru also said that the French bank would target the high net-worth individuals (HNIs) and the super affluent segment.
Talking about the wealth management business, Amoudru said that their overall wealth management business has grown in double digits.
“However, people are still very cautious while investing in products like fixed maturity plans (FMPs) and stock markets, given the current turmoil in the international markets?? he said.
