Fino Payments Bank reports 86 pc surge in FY20 revenues at Rs 689 cr

Mumbai, May 20 () Fino Payments Bank on Wednesday reported 86 per cent surge in its FY20 revenues at Rs 689 crore as its transaction volumes doubled.

The bank, which counts on ICICI Bank, Blackstone and state-run oil marketer Bharat Petroleum as shareholders, also said that it has clocked a maiden quarter of post tax profit for the January-March period but did not specify the number.

It also closed the fiscal year with an operational profit, the bank said in a statement.

Fino, which has its roots in business correspondent players, is among the select payments banks which has chosen to get operational after the receipt of RBI license and wants to turn itself into a small finance bank in a few years.

Business correspondents are retail agents engaged by banks for providing banking services at locations other than a bank branch/ATM.

In an earlier interview, it's managing director and chief executive Rishi Gupta had said that it is targeting to close FY21 in the black.

During FY20, Fino worked towards turning the perceived liability of not having an asset product into an asset, Gupta said, adding that the business is risk free now.

In terms of transactions, volumes almost doubled to 380 million in FY20 from 195 million in FY19, leading to a surge in fee revenues, the statement said.

It facilitated transactions worth Rs 1 lakh crore in the year, the statement said, adding that this is double that of the previous 12 months' throughput.

Domestic remittances from people earning in urban area to their families back home in rural areas accounted for over 40 per cent of the Rs 1 lakh crore volume in FY20, it said.

There was some impact on the business due to the COVID-19 lockdowns, it said, adding that the volumes in May are set to climb up to 80 per cent of the pre-lockdown averages helped by a rise in direct benefit transfer schemes of the government.

It had saving bank deposits of Rs 222 crore as of March 31, 2020.

From a network perspective, the payments bank doubled its presence to 2 lakh points as of March 2020, with 80 per cent of it being in rural areas, it said. AA DRR DRR