Barclay bets on India again with $400 MLN infusion for banking

Barclays said that they are pumping in more than $400 million into its India arm. This major step is to tap rising corporate and investment banking activity in the country that is now recovering from the pandemic. This is Barclays’ single largest capital infusion. This comes after the British lender pulled out of the retail business. Barclays said that the investment would help grow its corporate and debt investment banking, as well as private client’s businesses.

Revenue in India so far this year was $498 million. And this is from investment banking. These data are according to Dealogic. Barclays leads India’s debt capital market. This has a year-to-date share of 14%. Jaideep Khanna, Barclays country CEO for India stated that as economic activity gathers momentum, there is increased demand for capital from clients. Barclays mainly lends to corporates. And that is also to those with exposures largely to highly rated clients and subsidiaries of multi-national companies. Ananth Narayan, associate professor of finance at S.P. Jain Institute of Management and Research said that last year was a very good year for debt capital market in India. And more particularly, domestic bank credit didn’t take off much. There was a lot of interest in global credit and the overall market has been robust.

Barclays India’s Tier-1 capital has increased by 55%. The bank’s overall capital base has expanded and so its ability to lend more has been increased. Barclays inaugurated its international banking unit branch at GIFT City in the western state of Gujarat in February. This new unit is as a part of its expansion plans for India.