How We Did It

The methodology behind the BT-KPMG Best Banks Survey 2020

- TEAM BT AND KPMG

The Jury (from left): Chet Kamat, MD & CEO, Oracle Financial Services Software; N. Sivaraman, MD & Group CEO, ICRA Ratings; Shailesh Haribhakti, Independent Director & Chartered Accountant; Ranu Vohra, Co-founder & Executive Vice Chairman, Avendus Capital; Gunit Chadha, Former CEO, Asia-Pacific region, Deutsche Bank AG & Founder, APAC Financial Services

2019/20 was coming to a close, India went in for a severe lockdown. Banks had to test their business continuity plans as the pandemic was globally spreading from China to Europe and the US to Asia. The immediate strategy was to raise capital, initiate a stress test of portfolio and help customers. In a challenging work-from-home environment, Business Today-KPMG started the annual survey of picking the best banks and fintechs. The six-month long process started with knowledge partner KPMG studying annual reports and inviting self-nomination from banks, Small Finance Banks (SFBs) and fintechs for quantitative and qualitative analysis.

New features were introduced in the study. For the first time, the study included SFBs for both quantitative analysis and qualitative factors. Banks’ qualitative awards were expanded from Best in Innovation and Fintech Engagement to Best in Talent & Workforce and Best in Enterprise Resilience. A special recognition—Lifetime Achievement Award was also introduced. In the Fintech category, lending Fintechs have not been rated this year due to the pandemic impact and insufficient data in the public domain regarding the financial performance, asset quality and liquidity levels. The Best in Financial inclusion category is now subsumed in the previous category of SFBs, whose objective is to achieve financial inclusion.