Campu Bank Says Deposits Skyrocket in ’09

Riding the trend of rising bank deposits in 2009, Cambodia Public Bank registered deposit growth of 64.3 percent in 2009, according to the end-of-year earnings report released last week by its owner in Malaysia.

Deposit growth at Cambodia Public Bank, a subsidiary of Public Bank, Malaysia’s largest domestic financial institution, was nearly four times larger than that of its other overseas subsidiary in Hong Kong, which saw deposit growth at a merely robust 17.2 percent.

Precise dollar amounts for 2009 deposits at Campu Bank were unavailable yesterday as the company has not completed an audit of end-of-year earnings, due out in early February.

“The growth was backed by the active expansion of branch network and sales and marketing resources, on top of the active promotion of the ‘Public Bank’ brand name in these countries,” said Teh Hong Piow, chairman of Public Bank in a statement.

The National Bank of Cambodia announced last week that commercial banks had experienced a 33 percent rise in deposits in 2009 as investment decreased in a slowing economy.

Cambodia Public Bank is Cambodia’s largest bank by balance sheet and currently has 15 Cambodian branches, including a new, purpose-build head office on Kramoeun Sar Boulevard in Phnom Penh.

Phan Ying Tong, country head of Cambodia Public Bank, said the announcement could be considered positive as Cambodia makes efforts to see out the final stages of the global economic crisis, which analysts say has dramatically curbed foreign investment in the country.

“Because we have had very strong loan growth in the last few years…we also needed to increase our deposits,” he said, adding that the opening of the bank’s new offices in the capital last year had probably helped generate some confidence in the bank.

The end-of-year earnings report for Public Bank’s entire operations in Malaysia and abroad showed loans expanding by 14.4 percent to 137.6 billion Malaysian Ringgits, or $40.4 billion, in 2009. Net profit fell slightly to 2.52 billion Ringgits, or about $740 million.

Cambodia Public Bank carries out most of its loan activity in heavy capital sectors and targets large businesses particularly in import-export, property, wholesales and retail industries. The bank’s average loans size stands at about $750,000.

 

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