HDFC Bank is one of India's largest private sector banks, offering a full suite of loans, deposits, cards, and transaction services to retail consumers, SMEs, and large corporations. The bank operates through roughly 9,500 branches, 21,000+ ATMs, and thousands of business correspondents spanning over 4,000 cities and towns, supplemented by digital channels. Following its July 2023 merger with HDFC Limited, HDFC Bank now directly originates home loans — now the largest single loan product on the balance sheet — and gained majority stakes in HDFC Life (life insurance), HDFC ERGO (general insurance), and HDFC AMC (mutual funds). The bank reports four segments: Retail Banking (roughly half of net revenue), Insurance Services (roughly 30%), Wholesale Banking (roughly 16%), and Treasury and other businesses. HDFC Bank earns primarily through net interest income — the spread between loan yields and deposit costs — and secondarily through fees and trading gains. A key competitive argument is its low-cost CASA deposit base (~35% of deposits), which supports a cost of funds around 4%. The merger temporarily compressed margins and pushed the loan-to-deposit ratio well above historical norms, and management is deliberately growing deposits faster than loans to normalize this ratio, accepting slower near-term growth in exchange for a lower funding cost base. Longer-term growth levers include cross-selling to acquired HDFC Limited customers, rural and semi-urban branch expansion, and digital loan origination platforms.