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Vira-anong Phutrakul was promoted to the post of consumer business manager in November, making her the first local executive to lead Citi Thailand’s consumer-banking business, overseeing functions including credit cards and loans, retail-banking wealth management, e-business and consumer lending.
The bank has set itself a challenging growth target of 10-15 per cent in terms of customer numbers and revenue, given the prevailing economic conditions, she said.
To achieve the high growth target, the strategy this year is to make Citi Thailand the bank for its main target segment, that is, people with a family, those doing business overseas and/or who are globally minded, she explained.
In Thailand, Citi has a customer base of almost 1 million accounts, comprising credit-card holders, personal borrowers and wealth-management customers.
Wealth-management clients have total assets under management of around US$1 billion (Bt35.7 billion).
The executive said individual investment provided the main potential growth area for Citi Thailand, as credit cards were the mode of transaction payment for this type of business.
As a global bank, Citi has the strength to serve globally minded consumers and the Bank of Thailand last year allowed individuals to invest in offshore markets, she said.
The bank will be the first commercial bank in the Kingdom to offer an offshore-investment service to retail investors, with the facility set to become available this quarter.
Citi Thailand will also launch a new mobile-banking service for retail customers, through which they can buy offshore mutual funds.
“We and six fund managers globally will announce the service in the next two weeks, which will be offered to Citigold customers who have assets under management of Bt3 million,” she said.
The bank has seen a growing trend of retail customers allocating investment to the offshore market, Vira-anong said, adding that the trend of borderless investment should be an opportunity for wealth-management at Citi this year.
Wealth-management business is forecast to grow by 10-15 per cent after launching the offshore mutual-fund service.
The bank will also upgrade all benefits offered via its existing products this year, in order to gain market share and ensure that growth in both credit cards and personal loans outpaces the industry, even though double-digit expansion in these areas might not be possible, she explained.
The loan portfolio at Citi Thailand stood at around $2 billion at the end of last year.
Meanwhile, Phatra Securities yesterday announced wealth-management services for “mass affluent” customers with the launch of Phatra Edge.
“Over the last 15 years, Phatra has offered its expertise in wealth management for high-net-worth individuals and therefore has a good understanding of their needs,” said Kulnan Tsanthaiwo, managing director of the company’s Private Client Group.
“The number of ‘mass affluent’ individuals [with at least Bt2 million in investable assets] in Thailand is growing continuously, and these persons tend to place great importance on financial planning,” she said, adding that these clients need to optimise their money by investing.
“White-collar workers, employees paying income tax of 20 per cent or more, and people who invest in LTF/RMF [long-term equity fund/retirement mutual fund] products need help and advice with their investments, and Phatra Edge offers a complete range of features and services to help our clients achieve their life goals,” the managing director said.
