India’s private banks are on the ascendancy. At the top of the corporate banking market, the country’s three biggest private banks, in aggregate, have gained a large share of deeper relationships among large and middle market corporates.

India’s private sector banks got a major boost from the Reserve Bank of India’s 2020 circular establishing new rules on current accounts—effectively ensuring a minimum size relationship that corporates have with their bank, which strengthened the competitive advantage of large corporate lenders. Aided by that tailwind, the market penetration of large private sector banks (HDFC Bank, Axis Bank and ICICI Bank) for domestic cash management has climbed from 35% in 2020 to 40% in 2022. In the international cash management space, the same tailwinds have helped large foreign banks (Citi, HSBC and Standard Chartered Bank) increase market penetration from 58% in 2020 to 65% in 2022. This is not to say that other leading banks are not benefiting, however, given the overall growth in the economy.