Banking and financial services

Considering the growth potential of US$400-million worth in bilateral trade between the United Kingdom and Cambodia for the past five years, the British Trade and Investment office plans to establish its permanent branch in Phnom Penh. British companies are eyeing investment opportunities in education, construction and ...

Total loans and deposits at the Kingdom’s microfinance institutions jumped in the first quarter of 2012 despite what is typically a slow season for the industry, insiders said yesterday. Loans outstanding reached US$708 million for the period ending on March 31, climbing 9.8 per cent from ...

The ASEAN Infrastructure Fund, the largest pooling of financial resources among Southeast Asia’s 10-member bloc, held its first board meeting in Manila last week, but the extent to which Cambodia will borrow from the non-concessional fund has yet to be determined, experts said. ASEAN countries and ...

The Foreign Trade Bank of Cambodia (FTB) and Tong Yang Securities (Cambodia) yesterday signed a memorandum of understanding on financial consultation services and trade co-operation that is hoped to expand banking and securities business in the country. The MoU should bring the bank and the securities firm into ...

ANZ Royal Bank chief executive Damian Bell has resigned from the post he held for not much more than a month, a company spokeswoman confirmed yesterday. He resigned “several weeks ago”, Libby Armstrong, a Hong Kong-based ANZ spokeswoman, said by phone. No explanation was offered for ...

In Sihanoukville, just north of Cambodia’s only deep-water port, stands the headquarters of Chenla Seafood. A uniformed guard stands watch at the gate, which opens on to manicured grounds and a two-building facility that houses what will likely become the country’s premier seafood processor. A few ...

While shopping for a brand-new television, 27-year-old Loek Bunhai recently bought a Sony flat-screen at the Sunsimexco retail outlet on Phnom Penh’s Monivong Boulevard for $345. But with a monthly salary of $300 from his job as a microfinance officer in Phnom Penh, Mr. Bunhai was ...

Maybank will bet on what it said was Cambodia’s low bank-penetration rate for future growth as it transitions from a branch of its Malaysian parent into a locally incorporated subsidiary. With 34 licenced banks operating in a market with US$4.07 billion in loans in 2011, analysts ...

The Ministry of Economy and Finance yesterday signed a US$60.3 million loan package with Asian Development Bank to aid in reconstruction efforts after the Kingdom last year suffered its worst floods in a decade. ...

Maybank launched yesterday its locally incorporated company in Cambodia, Maybank (Cambodia) Plc, and will also build a 10-storey corporate office with the aim of becoming one of the top five banks there by 2015. Currently ranked seventh in terms of assets among 33 banks operating ...

Net profits at Acleda Bank increased by 86% to $49.4 million in 2011 as the company grew both its deposits and loan portfolio. In a statement released on Friday, Acleda said that loans grew by 35.4 percent to $989.4 million, while deposits at the bank ...

Diamond Island Development Co Ltd, owned by Canadia Bank, yesterday bought a 15 per cent stake in Investment and Development Company of Cambodia (IDCC)’s Cambodia-Vietnam Insurance Plc. The companies declined to give the value of the stake. Ngay Mengly, sales officer at Cambodia-Vietnam Insurance Plc, said ...

The Asian Development Bank (ADB), one of the two major financiers of the rehabilitation of Cambodia’s railways, yesterday rejected criticism that they were providing insufficient resettlement packages to residents displaced by the project. On Friday, the ADB released a cost study that showed that the compensation ...

The inquiry that targeted Hun To, dubbed Operation Illipango, investigated the shipment of heroin into Australia from Cambodia in loads of timber. Hun To, a nephew of Prime Minister Hun Sen, is a powerful and feared figure in Cambodia. He was once considered a close business ...

The Credit Bureau of Cambodia officially commenced operations at its Phnom Penh headquarters on Monday, according to CBC spokesman Steve Vaile ...

The long-awaited Cambodian Credit Bureau (CBC) launched yesterday, a move that is expected to increase the amount of information banks retain on the history of borrowers in the banking system. Despite loan disbursals in the banking sector growing by 25 percent last year, banks have so ...

The Cambodia Securities Exchange (CSX) is an important component of a larger ecosystem of capital markets, according to Eugene Lam, CEO of OSK Indochina Securities Ltd, one of Cambodia’s securities underwriters approved by the Securities and Exchange Commission of Cambodia (SECC). Lam says one of ...

The auditor who submitted a report used to convict a husband and wife of embezzling tens of millions of dollars from a company owned by the wife of a tycoon senator admitted yesterday that the quality of his audit was “poor”. The report was used ...

The long awaited first security listing on the Cambodian Securities Exchange became a reality on February 23 with the Security Exchange Commission of Cambodia’s “in principle” approval of Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority’s (PPWSA) “disclosure document for public issuance of equity securities”. This is effectively a ...

Central banks in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations plan to set up an “ASEAN bank” system that would make it easier for designated banks to set up subsidiaries and operate throughout the region, according to official sources. The plan to set up ASEAN banks is ...

How did the floods affect the industry late last year? Of course, we were worried when the floods began because many people were affected. When the floods continued, we did a survey and found that just about 10 per cent of MFI borrowers were affected. But ...

Digital cash services in Cambodia showed marked increases in users and cash flow in 2011, and still more growth is expected this year as operators launch new services and partnerships to capture a large but still-untapped rural market. The services, in which customers transfer money via ...

PRASAC, Cambodia’s largest microfinance institution by outstanding loans, planned to become a licensed commercial bank in the Kingdom, company officials said yesterday. The news comes despite calls from insiders and experts – most recently the International Monetary Fund and World Bank – for the National ...

Vietnam-based Dragon Capital is raising up to US$100 million for a new Indochina fund, some of which the private equity firm would invest in Cambodian agriculture and infra-structure, Dragon’s chief information officer Bill Stoops said yesterday. Dragon Capital has a 20 per cent stake ...