Bangkok--Jul 26--Siam Commercial Bank
Siam Commercial Bank rounds up its performance in the first-half 2005 with two “Best Bank in Thailand 2005” awards presented by Euromoney and FinanceAsia, major global financial magazines. This latest success is attributed to its Premier Universal Bank policy that aims to provide the customers with a full range of premium financial services together with outstanding profitable management in line with its move to be the “Bank of Choice”.
Khunying Jada Watthanasiritham, SCB President, said the year 2005 was a great time for the Bank as in the first-half 2005 alone it has been already awarded as many as 4 accolades by leading financial and media institutions. The latest 2 prestigious citations add to the Bank’s glorious achievements that are widely accepted in the international arena. SCB focuses on strengthening its core business operations by developing and diversifying financial products and services to comprehensively satisfy a full range of needs of customers — its corporate customers (loans, Business Cash Management, Trade Finance etc.) or retail customers (home loans, bancassurance, credit card etc.). SCB endeavors to tailor its service packages to needs of each individual customer, reflecting the value added to the Bank’s financial products and services for the highest sake of the customers.
Euromoney, UK-based leading financial magazine with over 145,000 readership worldwide, stated that Thailand’s banking sector has improved considerably since the last crisis and one of the most impressive financial performances has come from SCB. The Bank offers a comprehensive array of financial products and services to serve both retail and corporate customers alike, i.e. corporate services, retail services, corporate loans, personal loans, foreign currency exchange, international trade financing, Business Cash Management, custodial service, credit and debit card service, as well as investment banking service.
Despite being Thailand’s fourth largest commercial bank by total asset, it is one of the most profitable in absolute terms, demonstrating the fact that SCB’ s management is adept at maximizing the bank’s assets to generate more returns than any other bank, given that SCB’ s return on average assets in 2004 stood around 2.5%, far ahead in the competition, while its return on average equity was put at 23.5% for the same period.
FiananceAsia viewed that SCB had already reached its goal to be the best Universal Bank. By many metrics the bank is the best performing Thai bank. It posted baht 18.5 billion of profit in 2004 on top of its solid financial grounds with a 15.4% capital adequacy ratio and NPLs forecast to come down to 10% by the end of this year. The Bank is still growing its loan book with retail loans increasing 5.5% and corporate loans up by 3.7% year-on-year. FinanceAsia added that the key to the bank’s remarkable performance was its policy to put together a number of subsidiaries in securities, asset management, life and non-life insurance and hire purchase, which altogether have boosted the bank’s earnings considerably. Importantly, the Bank is willing to commit capital and time to ensure that growth can be achieved.
Moreover, FinanceAsia also dubs SCB as “Best Bond House in Thailand 2005”, the number one in terms of corporate bonds underwriter. In the five months to May this year, the bank has already raised some baht 40 billion from 12 deals with blue chip issuers both in local and global levels such as Thai Airways, PTT, and Asian Development Bank. It is also able to go up the value chain and structure securitization deals such as the recent deal for SICCO, the biggest ever of its kind.
Thanks and Regards: Phot Jaichansukkit, Public Relations Manager/ Contact Person: Wattanee, Sareeya Tel. 544-4501-3
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