ICICI Bank's exercise to raise capital of Rs 8,050 crore through public issue of Rs 7,000 crore and a green shoe option of Rs 1,050 crore is to meet its regulatory requirement for expanding global linkages and tapping the huge unexplored rural sector in the country.
While the size of the domestic public issue, to be made through book building route, is Rs 5,000 crore with Rs 750 crore by greenshoe option, the American Depository Shares (ADS) is Rs 2,000 crore with greenshoe option of Rs 300 crore.
The public issue will open on December one and close on December six. The price band will be announced by November 30. The ADS in US and a public offering without listing component in Japan will be taken up next.
Talking to newspersons here on Friday about the bank's future plans, ICICI Bank Executive Director Chanda Kochchar said the issue would link the country's booming economy to globalisation and focus on rural banking and even insurance business during the next 12-18 months.
She said the ICICI Bank already has overseas branches in Singapore and Hong Kong. Its subsidiaries have five branches in Canada and four in the UK. It has acquired one as a subsidiary in Russia recently. The bank has applied for permission to open one in the USA, but is yet to get it.
As to the bank's exposure in the rural and semi-urban areas, Kochchar claimed that the bank and its insurance business fulfilled the statutory criteria of 25 and 18 per cent advances in banking as well as in life and non-life insurance sectors respectively.
She said the bank looks at setting up low-cost, one-stop financial shops or kiosks or enter into franchise for distribution of multiple products through multiple-channel near major agricultural markets in rural areas. The future areas include micro-finance, including personal loans.
The issue also has special discount of five per cent retail investors including existing shareholders and also an option to pay Rs 150 per share on application with the balance payable on allotment, she added.
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