India's Canara Bank opens branch in Shanghai

Canara Bank, India's fourth-largest lender by assets, upgraded its representative office in Shanghai to a branch to mainly provide foreign currency services to enterprises, sources reported.

The Indian lender indicates that it made the expansion decision largely because of the booming India-China trade, which is expected to top US$100 billion by 2010.

A.C. Mahajan, the bank's chairman and managing director, expects the bank to play a key role in future development of bilateral trade.

Canara Bank opened a representative office in Shanghai in 2005 and won nod from the China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC) to upgrade it to a branch in July. 2008.

Other Indian lenders such as the State Bank, ICICI Bank, Bank of India and UTI Bank have also established operations in China, as per industry sources.