TANMAY OBSERVES!

ICICIBANK Investing + Short-term Pick

• ICICI bank is a huge financial conglomerate in India spanning across all financial services. It is India's second-largest bank (after SBI) with total assets of Rs. 3,849.70 billion (US$ 82 billion) at September 30, 2008 and profit after tax Rs. 17.42 billion for the half year ended September 30, 2008.
• The Bank has a network of about 1,400 branches and 4,530 ATMs in India and presence in 18 countries.
  
• ICICI Bank offers a wide range of banking products and financial services to corporate and retail customers through a variety of delivery channels and through its specialised subsidiaries and affiliates in the areas of investment banking (ICICI Securities), life (ICICI Prudential) and non-life (ICICI Lombard) insurance, venture capital (ICICI Ventures) and asset management (ICICI Pru AMC).
  
• The Bank currently has subsidiaries in the United Kingdom, Russia and Canada, branches in United States, Singapore, Bahrain, Hong Kong, Sri Lanka, Qatar and Dubai International Finance Centre and representative offices in United Arab Emirates, China, South Africa, Bangladesh, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia. Our UK subsidiary has established branches in Belgium and Germany.
  
• ICICI Bank fell largely on account of various rumours in recent past but the management has time and again came out and stressed about strength of company's fundamentals. Its CAR (Capital Adequacy Ratio) rose to 14% in first half of FY09 from 13.4% at the end of FY07.
  
• ICICI Bank currently holds 74% stake in each of ICICI Life and ICICI General Insurance, it has 51% of ICICI AMC stake.ICICI Life holds 29% market share in private insurance and overall 9% share. ICICI General has around 36% share in private sector and 13% overall. Both of these are the largest private insurers in India and ICICI AMC (market share around 12%) is among the largest Mutual Funds in India. These subsidiaries are expected to add a lot of value to the bank.
  

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