HDFC Bank is now ten times bigger than the crisis-struck Credit Suisse

India’s largest private sector bank, HDFC Bank’s market cap (m-cap), is now ten times the market cap of Switzerland’s Credit Suisse. As of October 3, HDFC’s m-cap stands at $99.31 billion, according to data from BSE India. Credit Suisse’s m-cap was $10 billion.

Along with HDFC Bank, several Indian banks have a higher m-cap than the crisis-struck Swiss bank. ICICI Bank, the second largest bank in India, has an m-cap of $74.32 billion, according to BSE’s website. It is nearly eight times that of Credit Suisse.

The State Bank of India (SBI) has an m-cap of $58.41 billion, followed by Kotak Mahindra Bank’s $44.41 billion.

Axis Bank and IndusInd Bank have higher m-cap than Credit Suisse at $27.96 billion and $11.53 billion, respectively.

The share price of Credit Suisse has fallen nearly 60 per cent in 2022. Its market cap has been more than halved since October 2021, from over $25 billion to $9.68 billion.

Moreover, the panic among the investors has arisen due to the bank’s high and widening losses for the last two quarters and repeated management rejig.

The bank has seen 3 CEOs and 3 chairpersons in the last two years. And the losses have widened from 1,326 million Swiss francs in Q1FY22 to 1,907 million Swiss francs in Q2FY22.

Bank’s current CEO Ulrich Koerner recently issued a memo to the investors and the employees saying that the bank has a “strong capital base and liquidity position”.

“I trust that you are not confusing our day-to-day stock price performance with the strong capital base and liquidity position of the bank,” he said in another statement.

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