The onboarding of depositors at CIMB Bank Philippines is seen hitting half a million by the end of the year, based on estimates by executives.
This was learned from D’Artagnan Aguilar, CIMB Bank Philippines chief marketing officer, who told financial reporters the number represents a doubling of depositor accounts of some 250,000 at present.
According to Aguilar, the optimism is fueled by the steady growth of people moving into the digital sphere in their daily lives as the entire country, encouraged by regulators such as the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), seeks to empower Filipinos through financial inclusion.
“We see the number of digital deposit accounts doubling to 500,000 by the end of the year from around 250,000 at the moment,” Aguilar said.
The Philippine unit of the Kuala Lumpur-headquartered CIMB Bank is a digital-only commercial bank licensed to operate by the BSP in 2018.
Aguilas explained that as a digital-only lender, CIMB Bank Philippines does not have bricks-and-mortar offices like ordinary banks in the country as its various services are conducted online.
According to him, while the lender was one of the early players in digital banking, its management has no plans of acquiring a digital banking license.
The BSP has extended only six digital banking licenses to various players at this point and has space for one more until the regulator declared a moratorium.
