Oranuch Apisaksirikul, the new CEO of Tisco Financial Group, vows to create wealth for customers in all business segments, which will be the key to putting the group on the path to sustainable growth in three to five years.
Oranuch was promoted as CEO in the middle of this year, replacing Pliu Mangkornkanok, who became the group's chairman. Oranuch has worked at Tisco for more than 30 years.
The ferocious competition makes it necessary for Tisco to retain its customer base, she said, adding, providing the most benefit to customers is the priority.
Creating wealth is how to offer long-term investment returns to cus
tomers. "We have to look at benefiting the customer first, unlike the past years, when fund managers opted to focus on selling products," she said.
Fund managers have learned that some financial products in the past five years might not have measured up to customer expectations. Tisco decided to turn to focusing on wealth creation for customers while product development is secondary.
The wealth-creation policy helps Tisco expand its customer base. She cited two businesses - leasing and saving - as confirming the meaning of creating wealth.
Managing in the current situation is more challenging than before when the global economy was insubstantial, so one has to be more cautious about unexpected risks in doing business, followed by the serious competition, especially the pricing war.
The company has to work harder to deal with the pricing war. However, Tisco's position is in a niche market, so the company has flexible management to deal with risk and cost effectively compared with others.
"The duty of the CEO is to drive corporate strategy to achieve the goal. All businesses in the group have to work together to ensure that policies will create the best results. I believe if all businesses in the group move together, Tisco's expansion will be sustainable in three to five years," she said.
Tisco's management strategy for survival in the financial crisis of 1997 involved cost management, risk management and cost of funds management. This can be used in the current situation as well, she said.
"Our position in the niche market makes us adjust business in line with the changing economy. Management makes Tisco able to stay in this industry until today," she said.
Tisco is the financial institution that offers the highest return on equity (ROE) in this industry at 23 per cent. The group has a policy to maintain its ROE at no less than 20 per cent. It has also tried to offer higher interest rates for deposit accounts and the lowest interest rate for loans compared to other financial institutions.
At present, Tisco gives a 0.50-percentage point higher interest rate on deposits than other institutions, while interest rates for loans have been adjusted to be competitive in the market.
Tisco forecasts that its overall loan portfolio this year will grow by 20 per cent. Lending will be considered along with risk diversification. The company will provide loans to growing segments.
Tisco Financial Group is a holding company. Tisco Bank is the main revenue contributor with 75-80 per cent, followed by Tisco Securities with 10-20 per cent, Tisco Asset Management 10 per cent and Tisco Leasing 3 per cent.
The group is satisfied with the current revenue mix. In line with Tisco's platform, it will select business that generates the highest return.
Tisco Financial Group earned Bt1.47 billion in the first six months of this year, up by 54.3 per cent over the same period last year. Income from interest and dividends was up by 29.6 per cent in line with the growth of corporate and retail loans.
Non-interest income has surged by 44.9 per cent to Bt1.804 billion.
Tisco Bank's loan portfolio in the second quarter this year increased by 8.6 per cent to Bt128 billion from the first quarter and by 13 per cent from last year.