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With a populace of over 1 billion, India is an stellar environment for banking, with cutting edge technology bringing the Indian financial scene into the future. India has over 32-thousand ATMs as of December 31, 2007, but an increasing number of customers are finding that the need to visit a bank branch or ATM location is not what it used to be, thanks to exciting technological advances.

Banks are moving toward allowing users to complete banking transactions using mobile phones and other hand held technologies. Banks, in the past, had utilized technology such as text messages to advertise promotions for customers, but electronic transactions will likely replace many types of cash transactions in India within the next couple years. The utilization of technology in bank reduces transaction costs and reduces the need for quick branch expansion. Currently, nearly 10% of all banking transactions in India are completed online.

This notion of handheld banking technology is called Mobile Banking, and it is assumed that mobile banking will revolutionize the bank industry in India and eventually all over the world. Already, 85-90% of mobile bankers do not use ATM or credit cards; they simply use their phone to complete transactions. The technology utilized to make this style of banking possible is the same technology that runs ATM machines, although it is much less-expensive to maintain. India is definately on the forefront of this rapidly growing area of finance.

An increasing number of Indians are also utilizing the Internet for bank needs, however the majority of bank customers using the Internet limit their activity to checking statements and assuring whether or not transactions have been completed. The World-Wide-Web also allows bank customers to interact with bank workers to ask questions and inquire about bank products and services, although this is not greatly used so far by Indian bank customers.

Generally, Indians have not carried a great deal of debt, with consumer debt making up just 4% of the countrys Gross Domestic Product, compared with over 60% for countries such as South Korea and Taiwan. Banks are willing to participate in the growing debt loads of Indian consumers. Like China and South Asia as a whole, India is one of the biggest growing areas for credit card, debit card, and cash card services, and surveys predict that the credit card market in this area will expand by 15-20% over the next three years. Indian houses currently save 28% of their extra income.

The bank presence is growing in India, as more International banks and financial companies hurry to compete for the varying banking needs in the nation. Demographically speaking, half of Indias 1.2 billion people are under the age of 25, so throughout the next next years, a big group of people will be entering their earning years and will have various banking needs. The banks which find a way to provide the services Indian bank customers enjoy a influx of new customers and profit in the years to come.