Malaysian Building Society Bhd (MBSB), an exempt finance company, may consider becoming a full-fledged bank, said its chief executive officer, Datuk Ahmad Zaini Othman.
“There is some kind of a plan for us. I can’t comment now because we are a public (listed) company. We can’t talk much about our focus because this is a major thing.
“Anybody that runs MBSB will at the end of the day get the aspiration to push it towards that end to become a full-fledged bank one day,” he told reporters when asked whether MBSB has a plan to be converted into a full-fledged bank.
He said this after the launch of “Kad Temanku MBSB dan Program Kerjasama Perdagangan Dengan VConnect Marketing Sdn Bhd” at Alamanda Shopping Centre here today.
MBSB is a company incorporate under the companies ACT 1965 and is a scheduled institution as defined under the Banking and Financial Institution Act 1989.
The status of an exempt finance company was granted to MBSB on March 1, 1972 by the Ministry of Finance and the status has never been revoked or rescinded.
The status allows MBSB to carry on a finance business without a licence.
Asked whether the management was holding talks with the authorities, he said: “We are always talking to the central bank, MOF (Ministry of Finance) and our shareholders.”
“The aspiration is there, the objective is there but to give the time frame is quite difficult because it involves a lot of things. First of all our people must be ready to be bankers themselves,” he said.
He said MBSB was doing well currently in providing financing, whereby to date its total receivables for personal financing alone had reached over RM2 billion.
Last year, total receivables were about RM1.3 billion, Ahmad Zaini said.
Ahmad Zaini said MBSB has disbursed nearly a billion ringgit for the past three-and-half months for the personal financing and was targeting about RM3 billion for 2010.
“We will meet our full-year target quite easily.”
On the factor that would contribute to such growth, Ahmad Zaini said: “We are putting more value-added features in our products.” — Bernama
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