JV Of SBI & Reliance, Jio Payments Bank, Made Its Entry

On November 10, the most eagerly awaited entrants in the payments bank sector, Jio Payments Bank Ltd, a joint venture between Reliance Industries Ltd, and State Bank of India, was incorporated, as per documents filed with the Registrar of Companies (RoC). During September 2015, the Reserve Bank of India, has given the in-principle approval from with a validity of 18 months, within which it was to be set up.

Meanwhile, SBI share price is trading above 1 per cent whereas Reliance share price is quoting above 1.50 per cent.

In other news, the Competition Commission of India has approved the amalgamation of Bharatiya Mahila Bank into SBI. Both the banks offer different banking products to their retail and corporate customers. Nonetheless, while SBI has made deep inroads into the interiors of the country, Bharatiya Mahila Bank has only token presence with four to five branches in each State.

Reliance Jio is the latest entrant in the country’s telecom sector. It operates a prepaid wallet under the brand named Jio Money, and the Jio Payments bank was incorporated only two days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared the decision to discontinue Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes. As per industry experts, the Jio Payments Bank would influence Jio’s mobile subscriber base and SBI’s vast network.

Officials

As per the RoC filings, Jio Payments Bank boasts of seven directors on its Board, which includes H Srikrishnan, who is also the CEO designate at the payments bank, Alok Agarwal and SBI’s deputy managing director of (Corporate Strategy & New Business) Manju Agarwal, who is also on the board of National Payments Corporation of India.

Along with them, the Board constitutes of Manisha Girotra, the chief executive officer of financial advisory firm Moelis India, who is also on boards of Mindtree and Ashok Leyland, Rajendra Kumar Saraf, who is a board director for Itz Cash Card.

Sethurathnam Ravi, the director on boards of several other companies such as IDBI Bank Ltd, BSE Ltd, Aditya Birla Health Insurance Co Ltd, BOI Merchant Bankers Ltd, along with president of IIHMR University Vivek Bhandari, are also on the board of Jio Payments Bank.

Airtel Payments Bank

Back on November 23, Airtel Payments Bank emerged to be the first one to go live, out of the eight companies who have suggested the launch of payment banks. These include Jio Payments Bank, Paytm Payments Bank, India Post Payments Bank, NSDL Payments Bank, Aditya Birla Idea Payments Bank, Fino PayTech, and Vodafone m-pesa.

Within two days of its pilot going live in Rajasthan, the Airtel Payments Bank registered more than 10,000 customers who opened savings account with it. But, the way to initiate payments bank ecosystem in India has not been smooth.

After 11 entities received in-principle nod, three of them — a consortium of Sun Pharmaceutical promoter Dilip Shanghvi, IDFC Bank Ltd and Telenor Financial Services, Tech Mahindra, and Cholamandalam Investment and Finance — backed out on their plans.

Tech Mahindra (Tech Mahindra share price slipped 1 per cent) dropped its plan saying that competition in the sector would only erode its already thin margins.