President Hong Sung-guk answers reporters’ questions during a meeting with reporters held on Feb. 2 at Conrad Hilton Hotel in Seoul
.(Photos:Daewoo Securities Co)
President Hong Sung-guk of KDB Daewoo Securities Co. said he will convert all the branches of the securities firm into “banking facilities” to focus mainly on asset management for corporate customers.
During his first media conference as the CEO at Conrad Hilton in Yeouido, Seoul on Jan. 2, he said he will make this the initial year for the securities firm to secure a base for sustainable growth. Hong said he will see that all employees are training hard to be true professionals in asset management, rather than going for restructuring and artificial manpower reduction to save expenses.
An exclusive PB House means that all staff at the head office and branches can provide professional consultations to customers on asset management, breaking away from the past operations like mediating sales of stocks and fund products to customers. The company will be like a private IB firm to manage the assets of individuals and business firms, the new CEO said.
The company’s special IB team recently completed projects ranging from the development of products, services and the means for cooperation between related areas, such as the supply of contents system.
In order to enhance the skills of the staff in charge of the private banking, the CEO plans to strengthen the training programs with the training period for new employees extended to six months from just six weeks. The training will include such major subjects as the maecro-economic trends around the world, Europe and North America in addition to the Korean economy, real estate investment and even health management and others needed to prepare them to take care of jobs well. The new president also plans to increase the number of staff working for the PB sector, which stand at 914.
President Hong also plans to find out new areas of operation to increase the company’s profit. He said he will look into expanding the asset management area of the IB sector for SMEs and also develop new securities products dealing with overseas assets of those companies related to raw materials in the frame of hybrid securities products. He said, however, he will stay away from cross-marketing involving the securities markets in Hong Kong and Shanghai because the sector has been overheated when the financial statements of those big Chinese companies involved in the investments in the sector are carefully analyzed. He said he will go cautiously on the company’s involvement with the IB market in China looking for the chances for making profits slowly but steadily to draw up the strategies based on serious studies on the market and the Chinese firms involved in the market, their financials in particular.
KDB Daewoo has the longest history in regards to overseas financial services among Korean financial institutions. It obtained approval for overseas business from the Ministry of Finance in June 1984, the first among local financial institutions, and opened an office in Tokyo two months later. In September 1997, KDB Daewoo established a subsidiary in London, also a first among Korean securities companies. Since then, it has expanded its subsidiaries to New York (1992), Hong Kong (1994) and Singapore (2012), thus leading the Korean securities houses’ business expansion towards the global market. It also opened an investment advisory company in Beijing late last year.
KDB Daewoo continues to explore overseas markets using a differentiation strategy designed by region. It plans to expand traditional corporate finance, trading and brokerage in Asian emerging economies, and strengthen its Principal Investment (PI) and Private Equity (PE) businesses in European countries and the US. Furthermore, it expects a maximum synergy effect through collaborative efforts with its affiliate Korea Development Bank (KDB), thus creating more opportunities for loan arrangement, PI and PE.
