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ICICI BANK, INDIA’S SECOND LARGEST PRIVATE SECTOR BANK, HAS REGAINED ITS LOST GLORY AND IS RACING AHEAD TO CAPTIVATE CUSTOMERS AND REWARD SHAREHOLDERS

- ANAND ADHIKARI

SANDEEP BAKHSHI MD & CEO, ICICI Bank

QUIETLY BUT INEXORABLY, ICICI Bank is getting back its halo. And winning the Bank of the Year in the BT-KPMG Best Banks Survey 202021, for the second year running, simply embellishes the point. At the heart of this turnaround is the softspoken, no-nonsense, humble-toa-fault, delivery-focussed Sandeep Bakhshi. In the three and a half years since Bakhshi, 61, walked into the corner room of the country’s second-largest private sector bank as its MD & CEO, the bank has not only laid to rest the ghosts of a turbulent governance debacle that hurt badly, but also returned impressive numbers to show.

With a three-year extension (till October 2023) in hand, Bakhshi has relentlessly focussed on core operating profits, which have jumped 1.65 times since 2017-18 to ₹31,351 crore in FY21. Net profits for shareholders have increased by 2.4 times to ₹16,100 crore, and consolidated assets have gone from ₹11.24 lakh crore to ₹15.74 lakh crore in the same period. Net interest margins have risen from 3.5 per cent in September 2018 to 3.9 per cent in December 2021 despite tough competition, and in the same period, gross NPAs have dropped from 8.84 per cent to 4.13 per cent. Investors are noticeably enthused. The bank’s stock has delivered 27 per cent returns in a year’s time, outperforming the Sensex’s 13 per cent, and the Bankex’s 9 per cent.

And what does the man behind the performance have to say? “We are [actually] temporary trustees of this institution, and there has to be [only] one strategy, that is, the institution must live more than 100 years from now,” says Bakhshi.