OCBC Bank (Malaysia) Berhad (OCBC Bank) has, for the second consecutive year, been named Malaysia’s “Bank of the Year” by London-based The Banker.

OCBC Bank, among the foremost foreign banks in Malaysia and in existence for over 90 years, is part of the Singapore-based OCBC Group (OCBC), the region’s second largest banking group by assets.

OCBC was also recognised as “Bank of the Year” for Asia Pacific and for Indonesia this year.

The Banker’s “Bank of the Year” Awards is a highly respected global banking awards programme that aims to recognise lenders that have grown while retaining a solid balance sheet, improved the quality of their service, invested in technology and considered their role within their local communities. The 2024 awards recognise excellence for banks in 127 countries.

In citing the reason for the selection, The Banker singled out, among others, OCBC Bank’s increases in operating profit, income growth and net interest margin; its green efforts and becoming first in the country to draw up specific plans to help businesses decarbonise through the Malaysian Green Technology and Climate Change Corporation’s online carbon management platform; and its outstanding social programmes which included a staff volunteerism rate of over 90%. It also drew reference to the Bank’s efforts to enhance its Shariah-compliant banking services using several innovations across retail and consumer banking, among others.

“OCBC Bank extended its $175 million Islamic green term financing facility through its Islamic banking arm OCBC Al-Amin to a local bank, making it the first example of an Islamic bank offering green Islamic foreign currency bank to bank in Malaysia. The facility applied an Islamic financing specific concept of value-based intermediation, whereby the proceeds are used for societal benefit, as supported by the central bank, Bank Negara Malaysia.

“During 2023, the bank introduced the Shariah-compliant online business account OCBC eBiz Account-i, which is tailored towards Malaysian-owned small and medium-sized enterprises with up to two directors or partners, and those in remote areas who cannot easily access a branch. The account can be opened remotely, and is integrated with existing functions, including the business debit card. The account is also linked to OCBC OneConnect, which also underwent an overhaul, with robotic process automation applied, reducing duplicate processes and enabling merchants to generate their own QR codes on account activation.

“Additionally, the Shariah-compliant BizFinancing-i financing facility was launched in August 2023. The product was developed to be fully accessible online, and in the four months to the end of 2023, had disbursed more than RM142 million ($32.4 million) in capital support to local businesses,” the citation read. 

It added that in further support of the country’s SMEs, OCBC Bank collaborated with Credit Guarantee Corporation Malaysia to provide up to RM100 million in portfolio guarantees, made available digitally to customers under both conventional and Islamic facilities. This has allowed increased support to small companies, many of which are still recovering from the Covid-19 pandemic. 

OCBC Bank CEO Mr Tan Chor Sen said: “We are honoured to be named Bank of the Year for Malaysia by The Banker yet again. What is more gratifying this year is to be able to celebrate the award with our colleagues from the entire Asia Pacific region where we were recognised as the best as well for 2024. The recognition affirms our on-going commitment to customer-centricity, sustainability, social responsibility, Islamic banking, digitalisation and SME development. It will spur us on to not just do more of what works for the communities we serve, but to keep challenging ourselves to excel and do even better. By enabling our people and communities to realise their aspirations every step of the way, we believe we will be entrenching ourselves as the bank for the communities we serve not just in Malaysia but the region as well.”

The Banker, a service from the Financial Times, is an authoritative source of global financial analysis and data-driven intelligence. It enables financial leaders to stay informed and make timely operational and strategic decisions through in-depth research and succinct summaries of global trends.