China Bank Savings sees steady loan, income growth
CHINA BANK Savings, Inc. (CBS) expects sustained growth in its loans and net income, driven by its focus on the education sector through its partnership with the government.
“We have to acknowledge our partnership with the Department of Education. We have a program called the automatic payroll deduction system (APDS). It’s a system for public school teachers to avail of loans from private banks, including China Bank Savings. This has driven quite a bit of our growth over the years,” CBS President and Chief Executive Officer James Christian T. Dee told BusinessWorld earlier this month.
This will help drive growth along with the bank’s auto, housing, and small and medium enterprises (SME) loans, he said.
“Together with our consumer loans like our auto loans and housing loans, and of course our SME loans, we basically have a full suite that will cater to the retail market. So, we’re supporting both the public and private sectors of the country. This has driven the growth in the last maybe about three years,” Mr. Dee said.
The thrift arm of listed China Banking Corp. expects to reach P120 billion in loans by end-2023, Mr. Dee said.
As of end-September, the bank disbursed P108.1 billion in credit, CBS said in an e-mail.
Loans disbursed through the APDS is expected to make up a large portion of the bank’s total loan portfolio, with P52 billion in loans expected to be disbursed through the system by end-2023, CBS First Vice-President and APD Lending Group Head Niel C. Jumawan said.
“We’ve already overshot our target. Our budget for this year was only P44 billion. We’re forecasting around P51 or P52 billion by end-2023,” he said.
The thrift bank will also continue to increase its network of branches and automated teller machines (ATMs) and boost its digitization initiatives to help onboard more customers into the APDS.
“For the rest of the year, we will be adding about four more ATMs. but for other technology for CBSGo, or for digital onboarding. That is what we will be pushing, for APDS especially,” CBS Digital Business Banking Group Head Adonis C. Yap said.
The lender had 201 ATMs as of this writing.
“So far, China Bank Savings has been growing exponentially. We’ve been opening so many branches. We have about 165 for a total of 257 offices nationwide,” Mr. Dee said.
CBS saw its net income grow by 10.08% year on year to P849.03 million as of end-June. It recorded a net profit of P1.6 billion in 2022.
Meanwhile, its parent bank China Bank saw its attributable net income rise by 11.88% year on year to P5.81 billion in the second quarter.
This brought its first-half attributable net income to P10.83 billion, up by 7% year on year. — A.M.C. Sy
