Joins region’s leading banks on The Asian Banker ‘500 Largest and Strongest Banks’ list

The Commercial Bank of Ceylon has added another prestigious international accolade to its collection, being adjudged ‘The Strongest Bank in Sri Lanka in 2014’ by The Asian Banker, a leading provider of strategic intelligence on the financial services industry.

The award is based on a detailed and transparent scorecard that ranks commercial banks on six areas of balance sheet financial performance: the ability to scale, balance sheet growth, risk profile, profitability, asset quality and liquidity.

It was formally presented to Commercial Bank Chief Operating Officer andExecutive Director Mr S Renganathan on Tuesday, 30^th September in Boston, USA,by Todd R. Burwell, President/CEO of BAFT, the association for organisations actively engaged in international transaction banking. The presentation took place on the side-lines of Sibos 2014, the annual conference, exhibition and networking event organised by SWIFT for the financial industry. Billed the world’s premier financial services event, this year’s Sibos conference was attended by 7,000 international decision makers and topic experts from financial institutions, market infrastructures, multinational corporations and technology partners.

This ranking as Sri Lanka’s strongest bank places Commercial Bank among The Asian Banker ‘500 Largest and Strongest Banks’ – a ranking widely followed by investors, analysts and the media as the leading source to assess the financial strength of commercial banks in the region.

Commenting on this latest international ranking accorded to the Bank, Commercial Bank’s Managing Director/CEO Mr JeganDurairatnam said: “The key performance indicators assessed by the panel of international experts are the components of the financial strength that is the ultimate goal inBanking. This ranking reaffirms that Commercial Bank continues to get all its fundamentals right even in tough conditions.”

Ranked alongside Commercial Bank in The Asian Banker 500 as the strongest banks in their respective countries are Westpac Banking Corporation (Australia), Janata Bank (Bangladesh), China Construction Bank Corporation (China), HDFC Bank (India), Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group (Japan), Maybank (Malaysia), ANZ Bank New Zealand (New Zealand), MCB Bank (Pakistan), DBS Group (Singapore), Shinhan Financial Group (South Korea), Cathay United Bank (Taiwan) Siam Commercial Bank (Thailand) and Standard Bank Group (South Africa).

The Asian Banker Strongest Bank is an annual assessment of the financial and business performance of the commercial banking industry in the Asia Pacific region. The assessment ranks the top performing banks in each country by strength, an evaluation that is based on a belief that a strong bank demonstrates long-term profit ability from its core businesses.

The winners are determined using a scorecard approach based on the six crucial performance indicators rated on a scale of 0-5.  In 2013, The Banker introduced a forward looking element called the “Watch List” into the evaluation. This identifies and considers the ex-ante impact of specific evaluation parameters, without changing the composition of the scorecard. For example, in this year’s ranking the magazine identified high net loan growth (CAGR of more than 30%) and low NPL (less than 1%) in the preceding two years as a possible source of vulnerability if there were a slowdown in macroeconomic conditions and a downturn in credit cycle and asset quality in the region.

The only Sri Lankan bank to be ranked among the Top 1000 banks of the world for four consecutive years (2011-2014), and ranked the most valuable private sector brand in the country in 2014, the Commercial Bank has won multiple awards as Sri Lanka’s best bank over several years, and was adjudged one of the country’s 10 best corporate citizens by the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce in 2013. The Bank has been rated the Most Respected Bank in Sri Lanka by LMD for the past 10 years, has been the second Most Respected Corporate entity in the country overall for the past four years, and been rated No 1 in Sri Lanka for Honesty in 2013 and 2014 by the magazine.

Commercial Bank operates 238 branches and an ATM network of 600 terminals in Sri Lanka.

Photo Caption:

Commercial Bank’s Executive Director/Chief Operating  Officer Mr S. Renganathan (second left) and Todd R. Burwell, President/CEO of BAFT (extreme left)with the award presented to the Bank