Maybank, The "Foreign Local Bank" In Singapore

By Jackson Sawatan

SINGAPORE, Oct 18 (Bernama) -- Standing tall among the buildings at the city's central business district is the 32-storey Maybank Tower, the headquarters of Malayan Banking Bhd's Singapore operations.

Often perceived as a "foreign local bank" among its customers, Maybank Singapore, which started its operations in 1960, is now the largest revenue contributor to the Maybank Group's overseas operations of RM1.44 billion, or about 56 per cent, in the financial year ended June 30, 2006.

Maybank Singapore's new country head, Pollie Sim, however, has no problem with such a perception.

"They perceive us as such ... a foreign bank that behaves like a local bank. We don't mind, it's fine with us; afterall we are a wholly Singapore team," she said at the media briefing, her first since her appointment this July.

She said such a perception, if anything, has made the public more accustomed to the bank and in some ways, could be a measure of how far entrenched the bank was among the locals.

"For the past few years, Maybank Singapore has seen strong growth in line with its strategic focus to strengthen existing core businesses as well as diversifying into new areas.

"During the 2005/2006 financial year, it recorded a 57 percent growth, propelled largely by the strong loans growth of 32 per cent, surpassing the industry's 14 per cent.

"The consumer loans portfolio doubled year-on-year, riding on the back of loans growth in hire purchase and home loans," she said.

Sim said as at June 30, these two categories of loans constituted 53 per cent of the Singapore dollar consumer loans portfolio totalling S$5 billion (S$1=RM2.30) to S$6 billion.

"Of this, car loans make up close to $3 billion, making one out of five cars in Singapore with Maybank financing.

"Over the last three years, car loans year-on-year growth had averaged 20 per cent," she said.

She attributed the bank's success to its human resource asset, a relatively lean staff strength of 1,200.

"Staff turnover rate at Maybank has been low, averaging 1.5 per cent compare with the industry average of above 2 per cent, meaning that clients will always get to see the staff they are familiar with," she said.

Sim herself has been with Maybank Singapore for the past 20 years.

She said Maybank Singapore was now moving towards diversifying into new business areas to become a one-stop financial services provider while at the same time continue to build on its core strengths in business and consumer banking.

"Such areas include corporate investment banking as well as growing its structured trade finance business.

"We are also set to introduce new Islamic banking initiatives before year-end. We have set up an Islamic banking team now to look into this and they are working closely with the headquarters (in Kuala Lumpur)," she said.

Sim said Maybank Singapore currently contributed about 10 per cent to Maybank Group earnings.

"We expect this to grow to 15 per cent within five years," she said.

-- BERNAMA