HDFC Bank investor wealth falls nearly $10 billion in six weeks
- On Tuesday, HDFC Bank, India’s largest private sector lender, was hit by a major e-banking outage, having faced three such disruptions since 2018
MUMBAI: Investors in HDFC Bank Ltd saw their wealth tumble nearly $10 billion in the last six weeks amid the lender's troubles over digital outages.
Since 15 February till date, HDFC Bank has lost nearly $10 billion or Rs72,241 crore in market capitalisation. The stock has fallen over 8% during the period. Parent HDFC Ltd has also lost over $9 billion or Rs63,536 crore.
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On Tuesday, HDFC Bank, India’s largest private sector lender, was hit by a major e-banking outage, having faced three such disruptions since 2018.
Customers took to Twitter to vent their frustration. The bank had apologised to its customers for the inconvenience and suggested they try using the services after some time. “Some customers are facing intermittent issues accessing our NetBanking/MobileBanking App. We are looking into it on priority for resolution," the bank tweeted from its official handle. The bank later tweeted that the problem has been resolved.
In December, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) ordered HDFC Bank to halt its digital banking initiatives and freeze credit card issuances until it addresses the lapses that led to a series of glitches. Days after the order, RBI governor Shaktikanta Das hinted that it does not take customer inconvenience lightly and urged financial institutions to spend more on IT infrastructure.
The RBI has also appointed an external firm to audit the entire information technology (IT) infrastructure of the bank. The lender has provided a remedial plan on its digital banking outages to the RBI.
"We view this as the negative development for bank as digital infrastructure has now become much crucial for driving the business. Industry is becoming very competitive and peers like ICICI Bank have developed strong digital infrastructure. Thus, unvarying technological glitches of HDFC Bank will definitely hurt investors’ sentiments", said Satish Kumar, research analyst at Choice Broking.
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