State Bank of India (SBI)’s investment banking and project advisory arm, SBI Capital Markets, has expanded operations to the Middle East with its new Abu Dhabi office, said two people familiar with the development.
SBI Caps recently received approval to establish a branch office at the Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM), an international financial centre. While the formal announcement has not yet been made, senior SBI and SBI Caps executives will be inaugurating the branch on 3 July, according to an itinerary viewed by Mint.
SBI Caps and Abu Dhabi Global Market is organizing an event, UAE-India Economic Summit: Fostering Synergies – Uniting the Falcon and Tiger Economies on 3 July where the announcement will be made.
SBI chairman Dinesh Khara, SBI Caps chief executive Amitava Chatterjee, ADGM chairman Ahmed Jasim Al Zaabi, and India’s Ambassador to the UAE Sunjay Sudhir are likely to attend, according to ADGM website.
SBI Caps’ move to set up an office in the region reflects the growing importance of funds from the Middle East willing to invest in Indian businesses.
The people cited above said SBI Capital seeks to capitalize on this opportunity, and plans to gradually expand its team to have a significant presence in the region. Sudhir had said in November that in the last five years, UAE’s sovereign wealth funds invested over $10 billion across sectors such as renewable energy, telecom, affordable housing, road infrastructure and startups, according to a PTI report.
When contacted an SBI Cap spokesperson refused to comment on the story.
In 2022-23, SBI Caps posted a consolidated net profit of ₹725.39 crore, as against a profit of ₹635.42 crore in the previous year. In FY23, SBI Caps was involved in transactions including debt syndication for the international airport project at Navi Mumbai; debt syndication for steel project capacity expansion for Jindal Steel and Power Ltd at Angul in Odisha, among others.
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