Granting of restricted banking licence to BOB International Finance Limited

The Hong Kong Monetary Authority announced today (Thursday) that the Monetary Authority has granted a restricted banking licence to BOB International Finance Limited (BIFL) under the Banking Ordinance. This grant of restricted banking licence took effect on 30 April 2002.

BIFL is a locally incorporated subsidiary of The Bank of Baroda (BOB), a bank incorporated in India. BOB Group ranked 432nd and 350th in terms of tier one capital and total assets respectively in the world.

BIFL has been registered as a deposit-taking company since 1980. The main business activities of BIFL are trade financing, foreign exchange and money market operations, deposit-taking, remittance, investment and corporate finance services as well as correspondent banking. The main reason for the application to upgrade BIFL's status from a deposit-taking company to a restricted licence bank is to accommodate its business development.

With the granting of a restricted banking licence to BIFL, the number of restricted licence banks in Hong Kong has increased to 48. Accordingly, the number of deposit-taking companies has declined to 48.

For further enquiries, please contact:

Jasmin Fung, Manager (Press), at 2878 8246 or
Sylvia Yip, Manager (Press), at 2878 1687

Hong Kong Monetary Authority
2 May 2002