MUMBAI: Banks are taking the battle to mobile wallet companies, armed with their readymade payment systems, wide merchant network and an on tap customer base, attempting to reclaim a turf which just a couple of years ago was their fiefdom.

In the past year, large lenders like ICICI Bank, State Bank of India, Axis Bank, and HDFC Bank, which together control around 40 per cent of local banking assets, have launched new payment instruments as they seek to prevent customers from moving money to newly emerging non-bank companies.

Advocating selective stock-picking in the banking sector amid current uncertainty over rising non-performing loans, ICICIdirect.com has advised investors to stick to shares of strong banks including HDFC and IndusInd Bank. The brokerage house has said other banks shares that can be bought are State Bank of India, Axis Bank and City Union Bank.

On government-owned banks, a ICICIdirect.com report said “entering PSU banks at current levels would not be a prudent strategy despite them seeming to be available at cheap valuations.

HDFC Bank has shortlisted five start-ups that it will work with to strengthen their web, mobile and payment offerings. The company shortlisted five out of the 30 applications it had received in its maiden Digital Innovation Summit, it said on Thursday.

The five companies shortlisted were Senseforth Technologies, an AI customer response system, Tagnpin, a marketing and customer engagement company, Safe 2 Pay, a point of sale-free payment system, Bugclipper, in-app feedback tool and Taptis Technology, a biometric payment company.

MUMBAI: HDFC Bank plans to partner a slew of financial technology startups that will innovate in various areas such as payments, security and analytics. Through such partnerships, the bank expects that it can roll out pilot projects within weeks.

The most valuable private bank has already succeeded in migrating 63% of customer-initiated transaction onto internet and mobile banking platforms. The share of these low-cost channels was only 13% a decade ago. ATMs, which accounted for 53% of transactions in 2005, are 21% of total transactions today.

ITC, Maruti Suzuki India, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Wipro, HDFC Bank and Cipla from the 30 share S&P BSE Sensex index hitting their respective 52-week lows after the index tanked 660 points during intra-day trade.

ACC, Ambuja Cements, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Nestle India, Thermax and Tech Mahindra are from the 73 stocks from BSE500 index touching their 52-week lows.

Five companies - ITC, Housing Development Finance Corporation (HDFC), Cipla, ICICI Bank and Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) - from the 30 share Sensex hit their respective 52-week lows on the BSE in intra-day trade today.

At 01:55 PM, the S&P BSE Sensex was down nearly 1% or 207 points at 23,203, fallen nearly 600 points in past two trading sessions on continues selling of equities by foreign investors.

MUMBAI: Top mortgage lender HDFC Ltd on Wednesday reported an 11 per cent rise in consolidated net profit at Rs 2,419 crore for the December quarter, driven by an uptick in commercial lending and better performance by subsidiaries.

HDFC vice-chairman and chief executive Keki M Mistry attributed the lower rise in net to "lower profit on sale of investments at Rs 57 crore against Rs 113 crore, lower income from leased properties, other income and higher depreciation compared to the previous year."

HDFC Bank on Monday reported 20.1 per cent growth in net profit to Rs. 3,356.8 crore for the third quarter of the current fiscal on higher interest income.

The private sector bank had a net profit of Rs. 2,791 crore in the October-December quarter of last fiscal.

Markets have turned range bound and are hovering near the flat line amid thin volumes.

By 11:35 am, the S&P BSE Sensex was trading lower by 6 points at 26,075 and Nifty50 was flat at 7,929.

MUMBAI: HDFC Bank, the country's second-largest private sector lender, has cut its base rate by 5 bps to 9.3% bringing its rate at par with State Bank of India. The latest rate cut is effective from January 4, 2016.

HDFC Bank has reduced its base rate by 70 basis points since April. The bank had slashed its base rate by a steep 35 bps in September. It had also cut this rate by 15 basis points twice, in April and June.

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