Finance and Banking Overview

Overview-
Banking in India has a long and elaborate history of more than 200 years. The beginning of this industry can be traced back to 1786, when the country’s first bank, Bank of Bengal, was established. But the industry changed rapidly and drastically, after the nationalization of banks in 1969. As a result, the public sector banks began experiencing numerous positive changes and enormous growth. Then came the much-talked-about liberalization and economic reforms that allowed banks to explore new business opportunities and not just remain constrained to generating revenues from mere borrowing and lending. This provided the Indian banking scenario a remarkable facelift that only continues to get better with time. However, even today, despite the foray of foreign banks in the country, nationalized banks continue to be biggest lenders in the country. This is primarily due to the size of the banks and the penetration of the networks.

Structure-
The Indian banking system can be classified into nationalized banks, private banks and specialized banking institutions. The industry is highly fragmented with 30 banking units contributing to almost 50% of deposits and 60% of advances. The Reserve Bank of India is the foremost monitoring body in the Indian Financial sector. It is a centralized body that monitors discrepancies and shortcomings in the system.

Industry estimates indicate that out of 274 commercial banks operating in the country, 223 banks are in the public sector and 51 are in the private sector. These private sector banks include 24 foreign banks that have begub their operations here. The specialized banking institutions that include cooperatives, rural banks, etc. form a part of the nationalized banks category.
Opportunities

The Banking sector is considered the most lucrative option in today’s job market. In the industry, a position in Treasury or Forex is considered right on top and this is followed by careers in Private Banking, Investment Banking and Retail Banking. One could work in a variety of areas in banking industry including Recurring Deposit account, banking officer, probationary officer, loan officer, assessor, personal loan officer, home loan officer, home loan agent, loan manager, mortgage loan underwriter, loan processing officer, accountant, product marketing and sales executive, and customer service executive among others.

In the Financial Services, some of the important jobs include that of a stockbroker who is essentially a person who buys and sells securities on behalf of individuals and institutions for some commission. While some brokers like to practice with individual clients others work for institutions. Brokers who work for institutional investors are often called securities traders. Many prefer to work as dealers, advisors and securities analysts. Security analysts are those who advise companies on floatation’s of shares as they are expected to have sound knowledge of capital markets.
Investment analysts are the backbone of the financial services sector. They study the financial reports of companies, assess various statistical information, profitability projections, compare financial results, survey the industry as a whole and on the basis of the available information, and finally conclude to a decision. Equity Analysts do jobs similar to investment analysts and research the equity markets and make predictions.

 
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