Foreign news: Citigroup sells Egypt banking unit, Square partners Apple Pay, bad loans for Indian ba

Banking Day staff
  • Citigroup has agreed to sell its consumer banking unit in Egypt to Comerica International Bank. The local lender will take over Citi's retail business in Egypt, which includes 8 branches, a network of ATMs and roughly 900 full-time employees, all of which will be transferred to CIB. Citigroup plans to close the deal toward the end of 2015, subject to regulatory approvals. The US investment research firm Zacks reported that the acquisition was expected to be settled in cash, with no other details disclosed.

  • Apple and Square have teamed up to release a new card reader that will accept Apple Pay's near-field communication technology and EMV chip-and-pin cards. Square will ship its magnetic stripe reader along with new hardware to ensure merchants can accept all forms of payment. Square will earn a standard 2.75 per cent fee on all of these transactions, allowing it to earn money by pushing the adoption of Apple Pay. Square is expected to start shipping 250,000 new readers in the third quarter of 2015, sending the readers free to any merchants who ask for them. Square said it would charge the $49 manufacturer's suggested retail price afterwards.

  • Despite government attempts to promote healthy lending, Indian banks' asset quality worsened during the year to March 2015, Reuters reports. According to preliminary data by the Reserve Bank of India, the ratio of banks' gross non-performing assets stood at 4.45 per cent as of March, while the net non-performing asset ratio was 2.36 per cent. India's ten largest banks saw their gross non-performing assets climb more than 12 per cent on the year to a total of 1.47 trillion rupees (A$29 billion). And while the country's largest lender, State Bank of India, reined in its non-performing loan ratio by around eight per cent, the private-sector lender ICICI Bank reported a 30.4 per cent surge in NPLs.