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With growth hard to come by elsewhere in Credit Suisse's global network, CEO Tidjane Thiam has turned to Asia. He has given Asia Pacific chief Helman Sitohang not only tough targets, but also a degree of autonomy. Can he deliver?
Illustration: Kevin February
Oh, to have been a fly on the wall when Credit Suisse CEO Tidjane Thiam told his Asia Pacific chief, Helman Sitohang, about the bank's new targets for Asia. At a time when China is slowing, the commodity price cycle has damaged regional growth, Japan is stagnant and uncertainty pervades everything from US interest rates to the fate of the EU, Sitohang was asked to more than double pre-tax income by the end of 2018. The figure for fiscal 2014 was SFr900 million ($914 million); under the new strategy unveiled in October, Thiam wants it to be SFr2.1 billion by 2018.
"I'm not going to deny it's aggressive," says Sitohang with a smile. "It's very aggressive."
At a time of considerable upheaval for Credit Suisse, Asia is being asked to save it. International wealth management and the Swiss universal bank are being bolstered as priorities too, but neither of those divisions has anything like the same expectations for profit growth as Asia Pacific - now a separate reporting division, with greater autonomy and authority than ever before.
The bank is putting its money where its mouth is, allocating capital and projecting an increase of risk-weighted assets in the region of about 60% over three years, taking it from 10% of group RWAs to 16%, which could equate to an extra $20 billion. It is also a rare example of a global house that is hiring, bringing in 80 private banking relationship managers in Asia in the last two reported quarters. But still, 133% growth in four years, in this environment. How?
"A lot of things will depend on markets, political situations and so on, but if we don't have any unforeseen obstacles, it's doable," Sitohang tells Euromoney in Credit Suisse's Raffles Link offices overlooking Singapore's Padang playing fields. "If our business was dispersed across many product lines like credit cards, consumer finance, trade finance, cash management, I would say I am not able to do it. But with the business we have...