Euromoney praises BDO as ‘best bank’ in PH

For banks and conglomerates, this month is not just earnings season: it’s also awards season.

The latest Euromoney Awards for Excellence recently named BDO Unibank Inc., a bank run by the Sy family, as the “best bank” in the country.

BDO, which is also the largest bank in the Philippines, was praised for its “exceptional” financial performance last year, during which it posted a profit of PHP73.4 billion, the highest in Philippine corporate history.

According to Euromoney, SM Group’s banking arm also won the “best ESG bank” award after financing PHP898 billion worth of sustainable development projects in 2023 alone.

Meanwhile, HSBC was named “Best International Bank” following a 21 per cent increase in new corporate customer acquisitions.

Euromoney also praised the UK bank’s Smartserve programme, which has shortened the number of days it takes to open an account, and its Omni Collect programme, which makes it “easier” to collect payments from businesses.

Rizal Commercial Banking Corp.’s digital expansion efforts have paid off: the bank has been recognized as the “Best Digital Bank” and “Best SME Bank” (Small and Medium Enterprises), particularly for its digital solutions.

Last year, RCBC launched its RCBC Pulz digital banking app, which attracted more than one million users in three months.

Other banks recognized include UBS (Best Investment Bank), Metropolitan Bank and Trust Co. (Best Bank for Corporate Social Responsibility), Citi (Best Bank for Diversity and Inclusion), Security Bank (Best Bank for Corporate Clients) and UNO Digital Bank (Rising Star). —MEG J. ADONIS

Digital-first approach is paying off

Companies that have adopted a “digital-first” — or, more aggressively, “digital-only” — platform continue to thrive, even as the initial momentum from the opportunities created by the pandemic appears to be turning into growth problems.

In the banking sector, the Bankko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) is preparing to open its doors to digital-only banks after three years of temporarily closing branches to observe the first six groups that were granted licenses.

Most digital banks may still have a long way to go to reach profitability and may be burdened with high non-performing loan rates — more than 20 percent, according to the BSP — but the business plan is so compelling.

So much so that even before the BSP began its licensing process in 2020, one player took a risk and set up a digital bank in the country.

CIMB Bank Philippines, although licensed as a commercial bank, decided to go digital-only and commenced operations in 2018.

Chief Executive Vijay Manoharan says parent company, Malaysia-based CIMB Group, decided to pilot the digital-only initiative because “the Philippines needed it the most.”

What Manoharan meant was that Filipinos lag behind their neighbors in terms of access to financial services (such as having a bank account) and, more importantly, access to credit.

Almost six years later, CIMB Bank PH has amassed more than 8 million customers. Including 6.5 million deposit customers and 3.5 million borrowers.

The experiment was deemed a success and CIMB Group decided to repeat it in the region.

“We are exporting this (digital-only banking) to other markets in Southeast Asia,” Manoharan says. CIMB Group also has a presence in Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam. —Ronnel W. Domingo INQ