President Cho Yong-byung of Shinhan Bank has been nominated to succeed the retiring Chairman Han Dong-woo of Shinhan Financial Group in March as chairman, pending the approval at a Shinhan Financial Holdings shareholder meeting slated to be held in March.
Cho, a graduate of Korea University, joined Shinhan Bank in 1984 and came up through the rank and file to take over as President and CEO in March 2015. Cho became president of Shinhan BNP Paris Asset Management Co. in 2013 and was promoted to take over Shinhan Bank in 2015 as the president after serving for two years at the asset management affiliate of the group.
At a ceremony on Jan. 3 at the head office, Shinhan Bank President Cho Yong-byung said the bank’s keywords for management strategy in the new year were Reform, Understanding, Happiness and Travel Together. He also explained how the bank can put those words into action.
By “Reform,” he meant “leader-type risk control” through digital transformation and globalization. By “Understanding,” he meant providing tailor-made competitive solutions to customers, taking advantage of the platform of One Shinhan. By “Happiness” he sought balanced support of work and life, where employees can show their capacities. By “Walk Together,” he meant carrying on with “compassionate finance” to expand customer value.
Following the New Year’s ceremony, a workshop for some 100 executives, including headquarters managers stationed around the country, took place on the 15th floor of the head office, led by President Cho. They discussed the operational strategy and business plans for the coming year, along with major tasks, including building digital systems, strategies for global growth and upgrading community cooperation.
Shinhan Bank was the winner of the 2016 Dasan Financial Award in the banking sector in recognition of its “Sunny Bank Service” strategy to lead the mobile financial market and the development of a credit analysis model. The bank did this by using Big Data and Blockchain technology to strengthen security for “gold bar transactions” for the first time in Korea.
Shinhan Bank has enjoyed high profitability at the same time, with the bank’s net profit in the first three quarters of 2016 coming to 1.511 trillion won.
The non-performing asset ratio was down to 0.79 percent during the period. At the center of the excellent performance is the “Sunny Bank Service” strategy that the bank has been pushing to lead the mobile financial market.
On top of its expanding network, Shinhan has been marking qualitative growth. Shinhan Bank's loans globally increased by around 100 percent from 2010 to 2015, and the global business provided over 10 percent of the bank's profitability last year, up from 2 percent five years earlier.
South Korea’s Shinhan Bank, fresh from its $7.2 billion takeover of LG Card, now has plans to expand aggressively into Asia as it seeks new areas of growth and tries to steal a march on its domestic rivals.
Amid fierce competition in South Korea’s rapidly consolidating banking sector, the country’s second-largest lender wants to acquire overseas financial institutions or buy stakes in foreign banks, as well as opening sales branches in other Asian markets, in a bid to become one of the region’s leading banks.
“Southeast Asia is the region we’ve been eyeing very closely,” said Shinhan’s chief executive. “Rather than just opening up branches, we actually might go in and acquire a local entity, a local financial institution.” Shinhan Bank's operation in Vietnam is one of the successful models for Korean banks' globalization efforts
It is preparing to enter Mexico and Australia while expanding its branches and offices in Vietnam and China. Shinhan was awarded a banking license from Myanmar's central bank in March, the first among Korean lenders. It plans to start operations in Myanmar in 2017. "
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