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Top 1000 World Banks - US and Russia take highest mover honours

The US has knocked China off top slot in the highest movers league, despite having the same number of banks in the ranking as last year. Meanwhile, Russian banks have made an impressive return to the top 25, after several years’ absence. Joy Macknight reports.
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Highest movers 2017

For the first time in seven years, China does not dominate the highest movers table. This year, only two Chinese banks – Bank of Cangzhou and Qishang Bank – make it into the top 25, compared with nine in the past two years and a high of 15 banks in 2010 and 2011.

The US has the largest number of the banks in the table – six – the same as last year, and Russia is a close second with five.

Russian banks have not graced the top 25 list since the 2014 rankings, when Tinkoff Credit Systems was the second highest mover, with a 307.45% leap in Tier 1 capital, and Otkritie Financial Corp placed sixth, recording a 147.21% increase. This absence can be attributed to the rouble’s plunge against the dollar – in 2014 it suffered its worst fall since the 1998 crisis – and 2014’s oil price crash, which led to a drop in the number of Russian banks in the Top 1000 from 29 that year to 19 in 2015.

Russia-based privately owned B&N Bank made significant gains in 2016, more than doubling its Tier 1 capital to $1.34bn, catapulting it into second place and improving its global Top 1000 ranking by 263 positions, from 846th place to 583rd. This follows B&N Bank’s completed merger into MDM Bank in November 2016.

However, the highest mover accolade goes to Istituto Centrale delle Banche Popolari Italiane (ICBPI), an Italian banking payments group. It posted a 181.6% capital increase to $1.72bn, following its buyout by private equity firms Advent International, Bain Capital Europe and Clessidra in 2015.

ICBPI – which ranks 496th in the global ranking, up 366 places – went on a buying spree in the 2016 financial year, thanks to the deep pockets of its owners. In April 2016, ICBPI bought Intesa SanPaolo’s payment unit, Setefi, and at the end of the year it signed an agreement to buy payment services provider Bassilichi.

While ICBPI exhibited impressive Tier 1 capital growth, two banks in last year’s rankings – US-based LegacyTexas Group and Taiwan’s KGI Bank – surpassed this expansion, with increases of 284.93% and 213.32%, respectively.

India’s Yes Bank is the biggest lender in the top 25 highest movers, ranked 271 in the global Top 1000 and ninth in the highest movers table. It recorded a 77.64% increase in Tier 1 capital to $3.83bn, moving it up 129 places in the global rankings. Despite scrapping its proposed $1bn share sale in September 2016 due to market conditions, the bank raised more than $750m by selling 32.7 million shares to domestic and international investors in a qualified institutional placement at the end of its reporting year (March 2017).

One place ahead of Yes Bank, in eighth spot, is challenger Metro Bank – the only UK bank to make it into the top 25 highest movers. Its Tier 1 capital is up by 79.66%, to $804m. In March 2016, it raised £400m ($508.5m) and listed on the London Stock Exchange.

Four banks in the top 25 highest movers join the Top 1000 rankings for the first time. The US’s Durant Bancorp joins at 946, with growth in capital of more than 80% catapulting it to seventh position. Compatriot Yadkin Valley Financial Corporation enters at 849, adding just over 70% in capital to reach 15th in the highest movers list. Meanwhile, Islamic bank Ajman Bank, based in the United Arab Emirates, and Russian retail bank Sovcombank are the 18th and 22nd highest movers, respectively.

Four banks have returned to the Top 1000 after a year’s absence and also join the top 25 highest movers club. Three are Russian – Tinkoff Credit Systems, Ak Bars Bank and Russian Standard Bank – and the other is the State Savings Bank of Ukraine.

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Joy Macknight is the editor of The Banker. She joined the publication in 2015 as transaction banking and technology editor. Previously, she was features editor at Profit & Loss, editorial director at Treasury Today and editor at gtnews. She also worked as a staff writer on Banking Technology and IBM Computer Today, as well as a freelancer on Computer Weekly. She has a BSc from the University of Victoria, Canada.
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