Final Ranking of SAR Countries Description  B'desh  India  Nepal  Pakistan  SL  Access to Finance  0.57  0.67  0.33  0.55  0.80  Performance & Efficiency  0.51  0.73  0.40  0.70  0.66  Stability  0.50  0.97  0.43  0.68  0.40  Corporate Governance  0.68  0.84  0.68  0.90  0.69  Total  2.25  3.21  1.84  2.83  2.55  Score [Total Points/4 (core indicators)]  0.56  0.80  0.46  0.71  0.64  Rank  4  1  5  2  3  Source: The World Bank  The efficiency of the banking system has improved, and can be gauged by the lower intermediation cost, which has fallen to 2.7% relative to 3.4% in the year 2000.
The freeing up of branch licensing in Tier 3 to 6 centres and the liberalization of the Business Correspondent model are steps for achieving greater penetration.