17-10-2017, 04:16 PM
ICICI Bank (Indian Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation) is an Indian multinational banking and financial services company based in Mumbai, Maharashtra, India, with registered office in Vadodara. In 2014 it was India's second largest bank in terms of assets and the third largest in terms of market capitalization. It offers a wide range of banking products and financial services to corporate and retail clients through a variety of distribution channels and specialized subsidiaries in the areas of investment banking, life, non-life insurance, venture capital and asset management. The bank has a network of 4,850 branches and 14,404 ATMs in India, and has a presence in 19 countries, including India.
The bank has subsidiaries in the United Kingdom and Canada; branches in the United States, Singapore, Bahrain, Hong Kong, Sri Lanka, Qatar, Oman, Dubai, China and South Africa; and representative offices in the United Arab Emirates, Bangladesh, Malaysia and Indonesia. The British subsidiary of the company has also established branches in Belgium and Germany.
ICICI's share in ICICI Bank was reduced to 46 percent through a public offering of shares in India in 1998, followed by an offering of shares in the form of American Depositary Receipts on the New York Stock Exchange in 2000. ICICI Bank acquired Bank of Madura Limited in an entire inventory in 2001 and sold additional stakes to institutional investors during 2001-02.
In the 1990s, ICICI transformed its business from a development finance institution that only offers project financing to a diversified group of financial services, offering a wide variety of products and services, both directly and through various subsidiaries and affiliates such as ICICI Bank. In 1999, ICICI became the first Indian company and the first bank or financial institution of non-Japanese Asia to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
In 2000, ICICI Bank became the first Indian bank to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange with its issuance of five million shares in the United States that generated a demand book 13 times the size of the offer. In October 2001, ICICI's Boards of Directors and ICICI Bank approved the merger of ICICI and two of its retail finance subsidiaries ICICI Personal Financial Services Limited and ICICI Capital Services Limited with ICICI Bank. The merger was approved by the shareholders of ICICI and ICICI Bank in January 2002, by the High Court of Gujarat in Ahmedabad in March 2002 and by the Superior Court of the Judiciary in Mumbai and the Reserve Bank of India in April of 2002.
After the 2008 financial crisis, customers rushed to ICICI ATMs and branches in some places because of rumours of an adverse financial position of ICICI Bank. The Reserve Bank of India issued a clarification on the financial strength of ICICI Bank to dispel the rumours.
