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DBS May Face Regulatory Action Over Outage

The Monetary Authority of Singapore said it will consider appropriate supervisory actions on DBS, which suffered recurring disruptions to its online banking services, including its payments app.

This is a serious disruption and MAS expects DBS to conduct a thorough investigation to identify the root causes and implement the necessary remedial measures, Marcus Lim, MAS’ assistant managing director (banking and insurance), said in a statement.

The regulator said the bank informed it about a problem with its access control servers that resulted in customers experiencing difficulties logging on to its digital banking services.

Lim said MAS expects all financial institutions to have systems and processes to ensure the consistent availability of financial services to their customers.

This week, DBS faced two consecutive days of disruptions to its online banking services, marking the worst outage for the Singapore lender since its ATM glitch in 2010.

DBS Singapore country head Shee Tse Koon apologized for the outage in a video posted on the bank’s website and various social media pages on Wednesday afternoon.

The bank also extended services at its branches for two hours and encouraged customers to use its phone banking services. In the meantime, I want to assure you that your deposits and monies are safe, Shee said.

November 25, 2021
Australian Regulator Warns of Lacking Crypto Protection
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission cautioned investors about cryptocurrency risks, noting that they are «on their own» for the time being as efforts are underway to develop regulations.

Consumers should approach investing in crypto with great caution, said ASIC chair Joe Longo at the recent Australian Financial Review Conference.

At present many crypto-assets are probably not ‘financial products for the most part, for now at least, investors are on their own.

Not unlike markets elsewhere, demand for crypto-assets and related services is on the rise in the country with big four lender Commonwealth Bank of Australia recently becoming the first in the sector to roll out a retail offering that will cover 10 cryptocurrencies by 2022.

Crypto is on our doorstep, here and now, and being driven by extraordinary consumer and investor demand. The implications for consumers are potentially huge, Longo added.

ASIC does not strive to eliminate risk. But, nor should we ignore it.
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November 24, 2021
Citi Hires for New Digital Assets Unit
Talent hired to work on Citi’s crypto division will be based in Singapore, in addition to London, New York, and Tel Aviv.

Citi has appointed Puneet Singhvi to the bank’s ICG Business Development team on 1 December as the ICG head of digital assets, reporting to Emily Turner, head of business development, with a matrix reporting line to Stuart Riley, global head of ICG, according to an internal memo seen.

Singhvi joins the team from global markets, where he was most recently the head of the blockchain and digital assets. He has also led teams across sales, business development, and product in global markets and securities services and treasury and trade solutions (TTS).

Shobhit Maini and Vasant Viswanathan will be co-heads of Blockchain and Digital Assets for Global Markets, reporting to Biswarup Chatterjee with a matrix report to Singhvi. The TTS Head of Digital Assets and the Securities Services Digital Asset lead will also matrix report to Singhvi, the memo said.

The bank will also add approximately 100 roles across its Institutional Clients Group (ICG) and associated functions to bolster its expertise in blockchain, including digital assets and digital currencies.

Citi said the locations in which it is hiring for the digital assets team is strategic for its ICG business and technology, and represent talent hubs for blockchain and digital asset expertise.

We are focused on assessing the needs of our clients in the digital asset space; prior to offering any products and services, we are studying these markets, as well as the evolving regulatory landscape and associated risks in order to meet our own regulatory frameworks and supervisory expectations.
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November 24, 2021
Personal deposits down across banking sector
Personal bank deposits were nearly VND5,292 trillion (some $230 billion) by late September, down roughly VND1.5 trillion against late August, according to the central bank.

Since July, monthly bank deposits fell against previous months, the State Bank of Vietnam stated, noting deposits in August decreased by some VND1 trillion against July.

From early January to late September, personal deposits hit VND150 trillion, a year-on-year decline of some 50 percent.

Lower savings interest rates and more attractive stock market and cryptocurrency channels were blamed for falling deposits.

Total trading value on Vietnam’s HSX, HNX and UPCoM stock markets reached a record high of VND56.337 trillion on Nov. 19, up from the previous record of VND52.145 trillion on Nov. 3.

According to a survey conducted among over 70,000 people by VnExpress on July 22, real estate was the most popular investment channel (32 percent), ranking above gold and savings (7-10 percent).
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November 24, 2021
StanChart Hires Amazon Technologist
He relocates to Singapore from Sydney, where he spent four years as a senior manager, solution architecture, at Amazon Web Services (AWS).

Standard Chartered has appointed technologist Brendan Royal as its global chief architect, according to a report on «eFinancialCareers.»

Royal has over 20 years of experience in financial services across retail, wealth and corporate banking, specializing in large transformation programs with a deep focus on tech and building enduring teams, his LinkedIn profile says. Before joining Amazon in 2019, he was head of banking architecture at Nordea, divisional director for BFS Architecture at Macquarie, and worked for CBA between 1999 and 2013, latterly as head of retail and business banking architecture.

The move follows the bank’s five-year strategic global agreement with AWS to drive its digital transformation and deliver new personalized banking services in the bank’s 60 markets worldwide, signed in November 2020.

As banks partner up with cloud platforms like AWS, they are increasingly also hiring from these same providers, the report said, noting that StanChart hired Google’s Singapore-based cloud engineering lead, Carl Bachman Kharazmi, as managing director and global head of cloud engineering and platforms earlier this year.
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November 24, 2021
China’s Anti-Monopoly Crackdown Hits Banking Sector
Chinese regulators extend their antitrust crackdown to the banking sector with a fine against shareholders of a virtual lender.

The shareholders of Chinese virtual lender AliBank – China Citic Bank (70 percent) and a Baidu unit called Fujian Baidu Bo Rui Netcom (30 percent) – have been fined 500,000 yuan ($78,280) over a violation of the country’s anti-monopoly law, according to a statement from the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR).

SAMR issued a fine over the failure to report the AiBank joint venture ahead of its formation in 2015.

The penalty was part of a broader batch of more than 40 cases with fines issued to other tech firms outside of the banking sector such as JD.com, Tencent, Baidu, ByteDance, and Alibaba.

AiBank is an artificial intelligence-focused lender that leverages related capabilities from search engine giant Baidu.

It is one of five licensed digital banks in China and the only one with a state-backed shareholder in Citic.

According to research by McKinsey released in January, Chinese digital banks own roughly 5 percent of the country’s 5 trillion yuan unsecured consumer loan market and over 7 percent of the SME loan market.
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November 24, 2021
El Salvador Plans to Build World’s First Bitcoin City

El Salvador continues to position itself as a crypto hub leader with its latest plans to build a Bitcoin City with bonds backed by the same digital currency.

El Salvador President Nayib Bukele announced plans to build the world’s first Bitcoin City on Saturday as part of a week-long event to promote the South American nation as the hub of choice for cryptocurrency.

Invest here and make all the money you want, Bukele said. If you want bitcoin to spread over the world, we should build some Alexandrias.

El Salvador became the world’s first country to adopt bitcoin as legal tender in September.

According to the tech-savvy 40-year old, the city would be built in the eastern region of La Union and be powered by geothermal energy from a volcano.

Also, no taxes will be levied except for value-added tax of which half will be used to fund related bonds issued with the other half used to pay for services like garbage collection.

El Salvador plans to issue the bitcoin-backed bonds in 2022, Bukele added.

November 22, 2021
UBS Fund Managers to Exit Amid China Property Crisis
Another two portfolio managers are leaving the bank after a fund was hit by China’s high-yield bond market slump triggered by China Evergrande’s debt woes.

Singapore-based Jiayi Yew and Brian Lou in China will leave the bank in January, citing a company spokesperson.

The pair reported to Ross Dilkes, who is also leaving the company after more than 16 years. Dilkes was the lead manager of the $3 billion Asian High Yield fund, which was established around nine years ago.

UBS has 26 staff in its emerging market and Asia-Pacific fixed-income team and it is looking to replace the departing managers with four new hires, the spokesperson said.

Currently, UBS is amongst the top five holders of Evergrande bonds at $274 million as of September 30, according to public data, which includes holdings invested client money like the Asian High Yield fund.

The fund also has sizeable positions in other troubled developers like Sunac China and Kaisa Group.

Year-to-date, Dilke’s fund has lost around 18 percent with approximately half of its holdings in real estate.
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November 22, 2021
UBS Names Successor to Chairman Axel Weber
The Swiss bank’s board is nominating a veteran of Morgan Stanley as chairman. UBS will also elevate a Swiss stalwart as his deputy.

Zurich-based UBS is nominating Colm Kelleher as its next chairman, it said in a statement on Saturday. The 64-year-old Irishman, who spent most of his career at Morgan Stanley in the U.S., is to replace Axel Weber, who will step down in April when he hits term limits.

UBS will also propose Lukas Gaehwiler as vice-chairman, it said. The 56-year-old is a former corporate banker who ran the bank in Switzerland until 2017, and now chairs the same domestic unit.

Kelleher in 2019 left Morgan Stanley, where he had overseen both institutional securities business as well as wealth management. He is battle-tested, having been finance chief and co-head of strategy at the U.S. bank during the 2008/09 financial crisis.

Gaehwiler is to ensure a Swiss balance in its board, a person familiar with the matter said. The search to replace Weber involved both the outgoing chairman himself as well as CEO Ralph Hamers, UBS said in March.

Kelleher’s nomination comes one year after that of António Horta-Osório at UBS’ crosstown rival Credit Suisse – and on the same day that Germany’s Deutsche Bank nominated Alex Wynaendts, a former insurance CEO who now sits on Citi’s board, as its new chairman.

UBS considered candidates such as Roche’s overseer Christoph Franz, Swiss ex-central banker Philipp Hildebrand, and ex-Unicredit boss Jean-Pierre Mustier.

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November 22, 2021
Julius Baer Profits Rise on Asset Growth and Improved Costs
Profitability in the first ten months of 2021 at Julius Baer «rose significantly», according to the Swiss bank, on the back of client asset growth and improved cost efficiency.

Julius Baer’s profitability rose significantly in the first ten months of 2021 on the back of strong growth in client assets and substantial improvements in cost efficiency, complemented by a near absence of credit losses, according to a statement from the Swiss lender.

Assets under management climbed 12 percent year-on-year to 484 billion Swiss francs with net new money inflows growing 4.4 percent. Gross margin during the first ten months of the year was around 82 basis points, down from 88 basis points from the full year of 2020.

According to the bank, this is due to «softening in client activity from the exceptionally high levels witnessed last year». It also noted that initial results this month indicate a potential recovery for the final months of the year.

Meanwhile, Julius Baer’s 200 million Swiss francs gross cost reduction program announced in 2020 is underway with cost-income ratio inching lower to 63 percent during the period, compared to 66 percent for the full year of 2020.
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November 22, 2021
Deutsche Bank Backs Nomination of Ex-Aegon Chief as Chairman
Deutsche Bank’s supervisory board committee supported the nomination of a new chairman, formerly from Dutch insurance firm Aegon.

The supervisory board committee fully backed the nomination of Alexander Wynaendts as the German lender’s new chairman and he now awaits the appointment to be confirmed by shareholder votes in May, according to a report citing an internal memo.

If successful, Wynaendts will succeed current chairman Paul Achleitner, another former insurance executive from Allianz.

Wynaendts has experience in the fields that always made Deutsche Bank stand out: strong expertise in retail, corporate, and capital markets business as well as in asset management – and a global network, said Deutsche Bank chief executive Christian Sewing in the memo.

Wynaendts has over 30 years of experience in the financial sector, serving as CEO and chairman of Aegon from 2008 to 2020 after first joining the Hague-headquartered insurer in 1997.

At Aegon, Wynaendts led the insurer through a 3 billion euro ($3.39 billion) state bailout and restructuring in the midst of the 2008 financial crisis.

He began his financial services career with ABN AMRO in 1984, working in the Dutch lenders’ private banking and investment banking operations in Amsterdam and London.
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November 22, 2021
Saxo Bank Taps Another Veteran of UBS
The bank’s Swiss arm is enlisting the services of a 37-year veteran of Swiss heavyweight UBS.

Saxo Bank is adding Claudius Sutter to its board of directors, it said in an emailed statement on Wednesday. Sutter takes over for Tino Gaberthuel, who is not standing for reelection.

The move is noteworthy because Sutter spent 37 years at UBS’ private bank, including several helping develop Smartwealth, a digital wealth manager the Swiss bank launched in the U.K., then abandoned three years ago.

Saxo’s Swiss bank is overseen by Andreas Amschwand, also a veteran of UBS. The Swiss banker ran UBS’ foreign exchange operations for nearly 25 years, before leaving for a board seat at Julius Baer and later the chair of Seba, along with Sygnum one of Switzerland’s first crypto banks.
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November 19, 2021
UBS Opens Major New Asian Office
The Swiss banking giant’s top two were on hand to open a new office in Singapore – its largest in the wider region.

Zurich-based UBS officially opened its Singapore office at 9 Penang Road, in a ceremony that featured Chairman Axel Weber, CEO Ralph Hamers, and Asia-Pacific boss Edmund Koh, it said in a statement. The 400,000 square feet of prime property will be the Swiss bank’s largest office in the region.

Singapore’s finance minister Lawrence Wong was on hand, lauding UBS’ efforts in the city-state with regards to talent development in a LinkedIn post. Fabrice Filliez, Swiss ambassador in Singapore, and Bloomberg founder Michael Bloomberg also attended.

For UBS, which employs more than 3,000 people in the city-state, the office represents a larger, campus-style, facility. The Swiss wealth manager has also settled into Singapore’s Command House, a historical landmark wher

UBS’ plans to move out of the financial district into Penang Road raised eyebrows at the time because the latter is not a typical headquarter location for a major bank. However, Penang Road is a stone’s throw from the prime Orchard Road shopping belt and the location offers good connectivity.

The bank launched two new initiatives to mark the launch: Techconnect SEA, an ecosystem that aims to connect and grow Southeast Asia’s next generation of unicorns, and an app called Circle One which will connect investors to ideas on a global ecosystem.
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November 19, 2021
LGT Opens Private Banking Office in Japan
Liechtenstein-headquartered LGT opened a new wealth management office in Tokyo as part of its efforts to capture opportunities in Japan’s private banking market.

Following regulatory approvals, LGT has opened a new office in the Okura Prestige Tower located in Tokyo’s business district, according to a statement.

The unit will aim to provide bespoke wealth management solutions to clients in Japan with a local team made up of over 35 experienced professionals.

Earlier this year, 25-year industry veteran Yoshitaka Nagakura was named market head for Japan and will now be appointed as chairman and chief executive for LGT’s Japan private banking unit, reporting directly to APAC private banking CEO Dr. Henri Leimer.

He joined from Credit Suisse where around two dozen other private bankers were reportedly also in the process of shifting over to LGT in Japan.

We are delighted to be expanding our Asia Pacific footprint with the opening of our Tokyo office, said LGT chairman H.S.H. Prince Max von und zu Liechtenstein in the statement. We have a deep commitment to responsible investing and we see tremendous opportunities to share LGT’s experience in long-term, sustainable investments and wealth management with Japanese clients.
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November 18, 2021
UBS Officially Opens Singapore Office
Swiss banking giant UBS has opened its largest Asia Pacific office in Singapore, alongside the announcement of two new tech-related initiatives.

UBS officially opened its Singapore office at 9 Penang Road yesterday in a ceremony that featured chairman Axel Weber, global chief executive Ralph Hamers, APAC CEO Edmund Koh and more.

Fully running on renewable energy, the 400,000 square feet of the prime property will be the Swiss bank’s largest office in the Asia Pacific region.

Accompanying the office launch was the introduction of two new tech initiatives: TechConnect SEA and UBS Circle One.

TechConnect SEA is an ecosystem that aims to connect and grow Southeast Asia’s next generation of unicorns.

The bank is also piloting its UBS Circle One app which will connect investors to ideas on a global ecosystem.

Also in attendance at the event was Singapore’s Minister of Finance Lawrence Wong who lauded UBS’ efforts in the city-state especially with regards to talent development.

UBS has come a long way, starting out with a handful of professionals in 1970 and growing to employ over 3,000 staff in the Wealth Management, Investment Banking and Asset Management businesses today, Wong said on a social media post.

It has remained committed to building up Singapore’s local talent pool, while deepening the capabilities and expertise of the industry in meaningful areas such as innovation, philanthropy, and sustainable investing.
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November 18, 2021