
With the objective of giving more flexibility to small finance banks (SFBs) to meet their customers’ foreign exchange business requirements, it has been decided that all the scheduled SFBs, after completion of at least two years of operations as authorised dealer category-II, will be eligible for authorised dealer category-I license, subject to compliance with the eligibility norms.
In a communication to managing director and chief executive officers of SFBs, RBI has said that the eligible SFBs may approach foreign exchange department, central office, Reserve Bank of India, with their applications along with the supporting documents with regard to their specified eligibility and requisite documents for grant of authorised dealer category-I license.
As per the eligibility norms for SFBs for authorised dealer category-I, the bank should have a minimum net worth of Rs 500 crore, its CRAR should not be less than 15%, the net NPAs of the bank should not exceed 6%, during previous four quarters, it should have made profit in the preceding two years, it should not have defaulted in maintenance of CRR/SLR during previous two years, it should have sound internal control systems and it should not have any major regulatory and supervisory concerns.