SBI to shut down 9 foreign branches as part of rationalisation

TIL Desk/Business/New Delhi/ State Bank of India is in the process of closing down nine more foreign branches after shuttering six such branches as part of rationalising overseas operations, a senior official said today.  The lender has operations in 36 countries with 190 branches, according to SBI website.

“As part of our foreign branch rationalisation, we have closed about six branches already in the last two years. There are nine more branches under the process to be closed down,” Managing Director (Retail & Digital Banking) at SBI Parveen Kumar Gupta said.

In an interview, he said capital is generally a constraint for most of the bank sites. “Obviously, you want to use your capital at the place where it is best utilised,” he noted.

Not all the branches in the foreign locations are full-fledged offices, he said, adding that in countries like Bangladesh and South Africa there are some small branches as well as some retail branches and there is need to rationalise them.

Even as the public sector banks (PSBs) have been mandated by the Department of Financial Services to wind-up businesses at unviable locations, SBI itself was looking to rationalise the foreign offices before the order came, Gupta said.