The Association of Mutual Funds of India would soon give its approval to Standard Chartered Bank, UCO Bank, ICICI Brokerage Service, Kotak Securities and Integrated Enterprise and Stock Holding Corporation of India to act as a point of services for issuing the mutual fund identification number to investors.
Following the AMFI approval, these entities would be given the clearance by CDSL Ventures Ltd, the nodal agency for MIN issuances.
Sources close to the development said UTI Bank and LIC Mutual Fund also will soon be getting similar approval.
UTI Bank has nearly 70-80 branches that sell mutual fund products and all these branches will be used as PoS. Initially, 15 branches of UCO Bank will be issuing MIN to investors.
Geojit Financial Services, Bajaj Capital, IL&FS Investsmart have already started their operations as POS. It is also learnt that ICICI Bank and Citibank are also likely to receive the approval soon.
The entry of more players would help in removing the bottlenecks in issuing MIN owing to the restricted number of players in the field.