Commercil Banks number 22 and 23

The 22nd and 23rd commercial banks, Bank of Asia and Sunrise Bank, is coming into operations from October 12.
Both the banks, which have Rs 2 billion authorised capital and Rs 1 billion issued capital — 70 per cent promoters and 30 per cent public — are promoted by prominent business groups."Sunrise Bank aims to be one of the leading banks by 2012," says Kishore Maharjan, CEO of the Sunrise Bank adding that the mission of the bank is to deliver the taste of modern banking services.T M Duggar group is one of the promoters of Sunrise Bank.
Similarly, Shangai group and Bishal group are the major promoters of Bank of Asia that aims at providing quality services on demand-based approach.
Three more banks got the approval from the board of Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB) this week making the total number of commercial banks to 26.
"NRB cannot stop any one, if they apply according to the rule," says Krishna Bahadur Manandhar, acting governor of the NRB. But with the increasing number of financial institutions, NRB has to increase its supervisory capacity, which is a major challenge.
The more number of commercial banks means the more difficult it will be for the NRB to supervise promptly.The market is not growing in proportion to the number of players that has been increasing in geometrical proportion recently. The banking yield has gone down because of cut-throat competition.When 2010 opens up market for international players, according to the WTO norms, the local banks will find it difficult to compete with them.
On one hand, data from NRB shows that only 20 per cent of the populace have access to banking services leaving the vast majority out of the banking reach. And on the other, all the banks are urban-centric.