DBS Bank India targets ‘mass affluent’ customers in pivot to universal banking

Mass affluent refers to individuals who earn significantly more than the average consumer at around ₹30 lakh a year, but haven’t yet reached ‘high-net-worth’ status.

Verma said the bank’s pivot to a universal banking model is already underway, having seen broad-based growth across its institutional, small business, retail and wealth verticals in 2025. It will look to maintain this growth across all key businesses in 2026 while focusing on select products and sub-segments, he added. He joined the bank in 2023 to head the institutional banking business and became its chief executive in 2025.

The Indian arm of the Singaporean lender is one of just two foreign banks that have local subsidiaries, the other being SBM Bank India. Other foreign banks operate through the branch banking model and do not have a wholly owned arm in India. However, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) allowed two others—Emirates NBD Bank and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp (SMBC)—to operate a wholly owned arms in India, in May 2025 and January 2026, respectively.

Tapping the ‘mass affluent’ segment

Verma said the bank’s Indian arm is looking to leverage the strengths of the mass affluent segment and invest more to scale the business. “There is a lot of potential among the young, upwardly mobile society… you would expect their wealth to grow,” Verma said. “We have the propositions, we have the teams, too, and the human capability to tackle it.”

Verma said the bank recently launched a premium tier called Aspire, which requires customers to maintain a total relationship of ₹10 lakh with the bank every quarter, according to DBS Bank India’s disclosures.

While Aspire is a new product, the bank already has DBS Treasures and Treasures Private Client for other categories of wealth-management clients. For Treasures, a customer needs to have a relationship value of ₹30 lakh, while a Treasures Private Client needs at least ₹6 crore. Typically, ‘relationship value’ includes all transactions between the bank and customer, including bank balance, investments, and even loans for certain banks.

DBS Bank India is far from the only lender that’s bullish on wealth management, with a large swathe of banks and non-banks trying to penetrate the market. However, its minimum relationship value of ₹10 lakh is one of the lowest in the industry. For comparison, State Bank of India’s (SBI’s) minimum relationship value to qualify for wealth management services is ₹50 lakh.

Verma said he doesn’t believe the bank is late in tapping India’s wealth management boom. He said wealth will continue to compound significantly and while the market is crowded today, there will be consolidation over time, even as the industry continues to grow.

According to a report by Deloitte in January 2025, India’s wealth management industry is expected to grow from $1.1 trillion in FY24 to $2.3 trillion by FY29. Deloitte attributed this expected growth to a change in how Indian households save. While households have traditionally held physical assets such as gold and real estate, more are now investing in financial assets, it said.

Hiring for retail business

To grow its retail business further, Verma said the bank plans to hire 500 people in 2026, across functions such as sales, branch managers and relationship managers. “Across our branches in over 350 locations, we offer consumer lending products which can be quite dependent on geography, like gold loans in South India, where we’ve seen good growth helped by the rise in gold prices,” said Verma.

In 2020, DBS Bank India absorbed the struggling private lender Lakshmi Vilas Bank (LVB), a move that significantly expanded its domestic retail footprint. The bank’s financial health has improved steadily since the merger. It reported a net profit of ₹684.3 crore in FY25, up 82% from FY24. In its latest disclosures, the bank said it had deposits of ₹82,777.5 crore and loans of ₹56,252.3 crore as of 30 September 2025. Its non-performing assets were at 1.89%, down from 2.84% a year earlier.

Beyond retail, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are another critical part of the business, with the SME asset business having grown at 37% compounded annually over the past three years. The bank is also “doing very well” in loan syndication, he added.

Citing data from the London Stock Exchange Group’s South Asia league table, Verma said DBS ranked first on the number of loan syndication deals arranged in 2025. “DBS Group’s balance sheet in GIFT City is quite material, and we are among the leading banks there,” he added.

‘Most significant opportunities lie here’

Experts said while India’s ultra high-networth individual (UNHI) segment continues to be well served, the most significant opportunities lie in the HNI and affluent segments—customers just below the ultra-rich tier,

Vishal Madia, partner, wealth and asset management consulting, EY India, said, “The number of dollar-millionaire households in India has nearly doubled over the past four years to more than 850,000 households in 2025. At the same time, retail participation has expanded rapidly, with mutual fund folios crossing 50 million and demat accounts exceeding 210 million, highlighting the structural shift toward managed investments.”

He said India’s wealth-management market comprises a diverse set companies, including full-service wealth platforms, bank with wealth management offerings, foreign private banks catering to niche segments, and a growing number of fintech and wealth-tech firms offering digital and hybrid models across the customer segments. “The emergence of digital and hybrid advisory models has materially expanded the addressable market,” he added.