Punjab & Sind Bank (PSB), a public sector bank, plans to set up 40 new branches this fiscal year, CEO and CEO Swarup Kumar Saha said.
This proposed branch network expansion will take place across India and will help the bank improve the resources of its checking account savings (CASA) account, Saha said.
PSB currently has 1,553 branches across the country.
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Low HOUSE base
Saha said that PSB would like to record a 1 percent increase in CASA from 33.59 percent as of now.
“For a bank of our size, our basic challenge is a low CASA basis. We need to increase that through a strategic thinking process,” he said.
net interest margin
When asked about the net interest margin (NIM), he said the bank would look to record at least 2.95 per cent NIM. In 2022-23, the NIM was 2.91%, 11 basis points higher than last year. “We lost a little bit of NIM in the fourth quarter. Maintaining the strategies that we have formulated, we hope to register a NIM of 2.95 percent this fiscal ”, he said.
To reach the NIM level of private sector banks, PSB needs to work on several fronts, including technology, reducing operating costs, etc., Saha added.
PSB is targeting 13 percent credit growth this fiscal year. It is also looking to further boost the share of its Retail, Agriculture and MSME (RAM) segment to 55 percent in its overall loan book.