All articles by Duygu Tavan
Duygu Tavan
Citi posts full-year profit of $10.6bn
Citigroup has posted a full year net income of $10.6bn, compared to a net loss of 1.6bn in a year ago. The bank generated $15.8bn in revenues from its retail banking business increased, up 7% from the previous year.
ICBC to expand in Europe
Industrial & Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) is going to open five branches in the next two weeks across Europe
Oceanic Bank predicts growth and profitability
Nigeria-based Oceanic Bank, one of the nine banks who received a bail-out in 2009, is expecting growth and profitability to sustain in 2011 and beyond. The group managing director and chief executive, John Aboh, said that the banks liquidity ratio met the level of 25% required by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
Korean Samwha Mutual Savings Bank forced to suspend business
The South Korean government has suspended Samwha Mutual Savings Banks operations for six monthsafter the bank failed to meet regulatory capital requirement levels. The suspension is part of the governments initiative to strengthen the countrys banking industry. The bank faces being put up for auction if it fails to restore the required capital strength set out by the Korean Financial Service Commission.
Citi to open more branches in Thailand
Citibanks unit in Thailand is to ramp up its distribution footprint following the Thai governments move to relax the countrys restrictive banking regulations. The government has previously imposed severe restrictions on the size of foreign lenders branch networks. In early January, the government said that foreign bank will be allowed to open two additional branches.
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Gemalto and MasterCard to replace cards within a day
Gemalto will provide MasterCard a single entry point for centralised data management in order to issue a replacement card within 24 hours upon notification, regardless of where they are.
OCBC targets older credit card customers in Singapore
It is exploiting what it considers to be a gap in the market after banks in Singapore came under public scrutiny for allegedly discriminating credit card applications by senior people because they had no fixed monthly income. The bank placed an advertisement in The Strait Times with the slogan: Finally, a bank that believes good credit should grow with age
Consumers turn to Google instead of financial advisors
Google has overtaken branch-based financial advisors as the primary source for UK-consumers to seek advice on retail banking services, according to the latest report by Greenlight. The search engine marketing company found an overall increase of 59% in the UK for searches relating to retail banking products between July and October on Google. Greenlight also looked at which banks and other retail banking related service providers were best positioned on page one of Google and thus most visible.
PSBank launches Prepaid MasterCard
The bank will charge PHP10 ($.0.23) on top of each top up, but said that there will be no charges if the card is topped up online. The bank will also demand an initial balance of PHP500 to issue the prepaid MasterCard and set a monthly top-up limit of PHP100,000.
Islamic Bank Kuveyt Turk offers gold via ATMs in Turkey
The metal is an important commodity in Turkey, where it is used as an investment or a present for festive events such as weddings and birthdays The bank offers gold deposit accounts, from which customers will be able to withdraw gold coins weighing 1 to 2.5 gram via the banks ATM machines across Turkey, or buy gold using cash or a credit card.