Indian financial services firm Religare Enterprises has entered into an agreement to acquire a portion of Citigroup's home loan portfolio in India, through its non-banking financial arm Religare Finvest, for INR5bn.
According to Abhijit Sen, chief financial officer of Citigroup’s South Asia unit, Citigroup’s Indian banking unit has a total loan book of more than INR400bn, with mortgages of INR90bn.
The deal is expected to boost Religare Finvest’s non-capital markets lending business’ total loan book to INR33bn, as it aims to expand the business to INR100bn in the medium- term.
Mr Sen said: “Our treasury unit periodically looks at small tranches of portfolio sale to deploy liquidity in fresh assets and optimize return on capital. Mortgages is a core and priority business for us and we continue to originate such assets,” reported Bloomberg.
Kavi Arora, CEO of Religare Finvest, said: “The demographics of Citi’s home equity customers perfectly suited us in terms of their assets, locations and profile,” the Economic Times quoted.
The acquisition is expected to be completed by September.
Earlier this year, Religare signed an agreement to acquire a controlling stake in private equity firm Northgate Capital, as part of a plan to build a global asset management business.