HDFC Bank rises on expanding its branch network

HDFC Bank is currently trading at Rs 2,360.00, up by 22.15 points or 0.95% from its previous closing of Rs 2,337.85 on the BSE.

The scrip opened at Rs 2,345.00 and has touched a high and low of Rs 2,370.00 and Rs 2,345.00 respectively. So far 10,535 shares were traded on the counter.

The BSE group 'A' stock of face value Rs 10 has touched a 52 week high of Rs 2,518.00 on 04-Oct-2010 and a 52 week low of Rs 1,785.00 on 25-May-2010.

Last one week high and low of the scrip stood at Rs 2,370.00 and Rs 2,197.00 respectively. The current market cap of the company is Rs 110188.70 crore.

The promoters holding in the company stood at 23.40% while Institutions and Non-Institutions held 40.23% and 18.90% respectively.

The country's second largest lender HDFC Bank in a bid to increase its footprint has opened 275 branches in the current fiscal taking its total network to 2,000. The bank had a total of 1,780 branches by the end of December 2010 compared to its distribution network of 1,725 branches in 779 cities as on March 2010. About 220 branches were added to the network in the last few months.

Besides having an overseas presence in Hong Kong and Bahrain, the bank’s reach after the opening of new branches has crossed 1,000 cities. As per the annual report for 2009-10, the bank opened over 300 new branches during the year. The bank's focus on semi-urban and under-banked markets continued, with 68 per cent of the bank's branches now outside the top nine Indian cities.

The bank, which has over 1.8 crore customers, acquired Centurion Bank of Punjab leading to the integration of 404 branches in 2008. Recently, HDFC bank has won the 'Best Retail Bank in India' award for the fifth year in a row beating a host of other competitors in Asia Pacific, Middle-East, Central Asia and Africa on a range of parameters.

HDFC Bank has also paid higher advance corporate tax for the fourth quarter. The company has paid Rs 500 crore as advance corporate tax, higher by 66.67% as compared to Rs 300 crore paid during same quarter last year.