West End Housing applies for small finance bank licence with RBI

The Reserve Bank on Friday said West End Housing Finance Ltd has applied for 'on tap' licence for setting up a small finance bank.

In August, Cosmea Financial Holdings Pvt Ltd and Tally Solutions, too had applied for the licence.

"In continuation to the press release dated August 30, 2021, the Reserve Bank of India has received an application under the guidelines for 'on tap' Licensing of Small Finance Banks dated December 5, 2019 from West End Housing Finance Limited," the RBI said in a statement.

West End Housing Finance is headquartered at Mumbai.

In April, VSoft Technologies Pvt Ltd, Calicut City Service Cooperative Bank Ltd, Shri Akhil Kumar Gupta, and Dvara Kshetriya Gramin Financial Services Pvt Ltd applied for the licence.

USFB, promoted by Centrum Financial Services along with Resilient Innovation Pvt Ltd as 'joint investor', was granted a banking licence in October 2021. USFB started functioning on November 1.

Currently there are about a dozen small finance banks in the country.

The guidelines for 'on tap' licensing of universal banks and SFBs in the private sector, were issued on August 1, 2016 and December 5, 2019, respectively.

As per the guidelines, the initial minimum paid-up voting equity capital for a universal bank should be Rs 500 crore.

Thereafter, the bank should have a minimum net worth of Rs 500 crore at all times.

The minimum paid-up voting capital/net worth for SFBs should be Rs 200 crore. In case of urban cooperative banks desirous of voluntarily transiting into SFBs, the initial requirement of net worth is Rs 100 crore, which will have to be increased to Rs 200 crore within five years.

The RBI, in March this year, had announced a Standing External Advisory Committee for evaluating applications for universal banks and small finance banks.