PNB anticipates 5.6-percent growth in OFW remittance

Philippine National Bank (PNB) anticipates handling a little over $5 billion worth of foreign-currency earnings by overseas Filipinos passing through its various remittance outlets this year.

In a regulatory filing, the PNB said some $5.04 billion worth of remittances from all over the world would have been processed during the year, up 5.6 percent from last year’s $4.78 billion.

PNB aims to further strengthen its leadership in the remittance market where it currently enjoys a 21-percent market share.

It plans to further increase its share in the remittance market by going beyond the usual service and offer instead a more diverse menu of financial services.

"The bank will continue to enhance its products aimed at delivering optimum services, particularly by introducing electronic-remittance channels," PNB told the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE).

"In addition to its large global distribution network, the bank will keep on partnering with companies that are considered leaders in their home markets to reinforce its overseas presence," it added.

PNB will be focusing more on service quality, product innovation and marketing initiatives to be able to increase the remittance volume and/or increased foreign currency business.

"The bank will leverage on the strength of its nationwide branch network to generate low-cost deposits from its existing and growing customer base. In support of the expansion in total assets, the bank will also keep an acceptable level of high cost deposits to complement the low-cost deposit base," it added.

PNB is maximizing the synergy from its merger with Allied Bank and bring together a combined complementary client base ranging from large corporations, local government units, government-owned and controlled corporations, the overseas Filipino workers, the Chinese-Filipino community to the provincial market.

Significantly, the merged bank can leverage and harness on the wide network of its major shareholder, LT Group Inc., the primary holding company in the country.

"PNB and Allied Bank will have a better platform to offer a wide range of personal and corporate banking services and products, and become a leading player in its chosen markets," the bank said.

The increase in revenues were also seen boosted by its new customers, increased business from existing customers, low funding cost from improved risk profile and greater opportunities for cross-selling bancassurance, trust, credit card and other products to a larger customer base via a wider distribution network.

The bank will likewise benefit from cost efficiency improvements through branch re-engineering, economies of scale, systems integration, realignment of front offices and optimization of back office processing and support functions.

– Factao, G. (2014, February 18) PNB anticipates 5.6-percent growth in OFW remittance. Business Mirror, p. B2