Indbank Merchant Banking Services (Indbank), a subsidiary of public sector Indian Bank, opened its first ‘trading cafe’ for stock trading in Chennai. It plans to open another 20 such cafes and 18 new branches during 2008-09 across the country.

Indian Bank is the first public sector bank to open such a cafe for stock trading facility, A Subramanian, executive director, Indian Bank, told Business Standard.

Indbank plans to establish around 200 such cafes in tier-II and tier-III cities across the country in a phased manner.

The cafes will be opened in residential areas and target mostly housewives and elders, who are largely getting into trading these days, in the middle income families, he added.

Customers having a demat account with Indbank or with Indian Bank and a savings bank account with Indian Bank can trade through the cafe, he said.

Indbank plans to open new branches in Puducherry by this month end. Branches in Vadodara, Kolkata, Vijayawada, Raipur, Pune, Jaipur, Indore and Kochi will commence operations before next fiscal, he said. Source: business-standard