Deals
Modi Creates Bank Behemoths to Spur India’s Slowing Economy
- New merged lenders will hold 56% of industry’s business
- Economic growth slumps to 5%, lower than 5.7% survey estimate
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India announced its most sweeping bank overhaul in decades, minutes before data showed economic growth in Asia’s No. 3 economy slumped to a six-year low.
Four new lenders that result from a series of state-bank mergers will hold business worth 55.8 trillion rupees ($781 billion), or about 56% of the Indian banking industry, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said at a briefing in New Delhi on Friday. The government will inject a combined 552.5 billion rupees of capital into these entities, she said.