Standard Chartered Gets Nod To Offer Wealth Management Services From GIFT City

Standard Chartered has received in-principle approval to offer wealth management products to clients from Gujarat International Finance Tec-City (GIFT City), India's tax-neutral financial hub, the bank said in a statement on Thursday.

The International Financial Services Centres Authority (IFSCA), the regulator overseeing the hub, granted the approval. Standard Chartered expects to launch its retail wealth management offerings from GIFT City over the coming months.

P D Singh, CEO of India and South Asia at Standard Chartered, said in the statement, "Building on our deep roots in the GIFT City ecosystem, this distribution approval enables us to bring Standard Chartered's global wealth management capabilities, while supporting GIFT City's ambition to become a leading international financial services centre."

With this approval, Standard Chartered will join HSBC in offering wealth management products directly from the International Financial Services Centre (IFSC).

Notably, Standard Chartered became the first foreign bank to begin operations in GIFT City in 2020. It currently offers lending, trade finance, transaction banking and financial markets products to corporate and institutional clients from the hub. The bank was also earlier appointed by policymakers to manage US dollar clearances for a foreign currency settlement system set up in the zone.

According to the bank, it serves more than 600 clients in GIFT City, including multinational companies, domestic corporates, financial institutions and small and medium enterprises, and has financed over $25 billion across various products.

Over the years, Standard Chartered has introduced several market-first offerings in GIFT City, including offshore derivative instrument issuances, bullion hedging solutions, receivables factoring, corporate treasury management solutions and foreign currency settlement services.

The approval comes as GIFT City continues to widen its wealth and asset management ecosystem. Regulators have introduced a series of measures to attract global capital and financial institutions to the hub, while several banks and wealth managers have expanded their presence in the IFSC to offer offshore investment and cross-border wealth solutions.