US law firm seeks class action suit against HDFC Bank

MUMBAI: New York-based Rosen Law Firm has said it is investigating potential claims on behalf of shareholders of HDFC Bank after information that the lender may have issued materially misleading business information to investing public. The statement quotes media reports of irregularities in the bank’s auto loan business.
“We were unaware of any such development (class action lawsuit) till we heard about it from the media a little earlier today.We are getting details of it. We’ll examine it and respond to it as appropriate. Prima facie it does look frivolous as we believe we have been transparent in our disclosures,” an HDFC Bank spokesperson said in response to a query. TNN
Rosen is the same law firm that had last year initiated a class action against Infosys after an anonymous whistleblower complaint about irregularities in the IT firm.
The statement by the investor rights law firm cited an ET report of July 13, which said that HDFC Bank had “conducted a probe into allegations of improper lending practices and conflicts of interests in its vehicle-financing operations involving the unit’s former head”. Following this report, HDFC Bank’s American depositary receipt price fell by $1.37 per share, or nearly 3%, to close at $47.02 per share on July 13. This was followed by the bank’s results and on August 6 another news report said that credit bureau Experian had informed the RBI that HDFC Bank has been late in passing details of its loans to the credit bureau.