What are the reasons of the merger of Syndicate Bank and Canara Bank?

The Government of India approved the amalgamation of Syndicate Bank into Canara Bank to make it a globally competitive lender. With the amalgamation, the new bank will become the fourth largest bank after State Bank of India, PNB+OBC+United Bank of India & Bank of Baroda (as at Dec 2019).

Any amalgamation of one or more banks provides a broader geographic footprint and helps to derive the benefit of size, scale, strength. Now, the combined entity has a network of close to 10,396 branches and approximately 13,408 ATMs across India.

(Canara Bank – 8,837 ATMs & 6,333 Branches, Syndicate Bank – 4,571 ATMs & 4,063 branches).