India’s largest private lender HDFC Bank took over State Bank of India (SBI) to secure the top spot on the list of 2023 CRISIL’s Greenwich market share Leaders in big Corporate Banking. For middle market corporates, HDFC Bank again topped the list of 2023 Leaders among local banks and joined ICICI Bank as the year’s joint Greenwich Quality Leaders. Coalition Greenwich, a division of CRISIL, said many of the gains for the large private sector and foreign banks came at the price of the smaller banks, including some of India’s public sector banks.

Even among the PSUs, the trend toward consolidation among the largest providers persisted, with SBI doing a better job than smaller banks at maintaining corporate relationships, it added. From 2021 to 2022, the share of Indian corporates working with one of the largest Indian private sector banks for overall corporate banking services increased to 38 percent from 33 percent. Over the same period, the share of corporates working with at least one large foreign bank climbed to 21 percent from 18 percent. Over the 12-month period, the share of Indian corporates working with at least one of the country’s smaller private sector banks dropped to 18 percent from 21 percent.

CRISIL’s unit said Indian companies are joining forces with the country’s largest banks to help fuel their drive to become bigger, more international, and more efficient. Industry revenue pools across banking grew by 16 percent overall year on year. The largest driver was the growth in cash management on the back of the higher rates environment.“We also saw double-digit growth for domestic and cross-border trade. The capex cycle has been a key driver for growth in lending for banks in India as well”, it added. Nearly 90 percent of the large and middle-market Indian corporates participating in the most recent Coalition Greenwich study were optimistic about the outlook for their businesses over the coming year.