PSBank gets highest rating in survey

MANILA, Philippines - Philippine Savings Bank (PSBank) garnered the highest ranking among Philippine banks in terms of investor relations, a survey by The Asian Banker, a leading regional financial publication, said.

The Asian Banker’s Investor Relations Ranking 2009 is an annual ranking of the top 150 banks in 12 markets in the Asia Pacific region, including Japan. It presents the most comprehensive evaluation of banks by assessing the quality and strength of their investor relations (IR) capabilities, and their attractiveness to global and regional investors.

The survey evaluates commercial bank’s IR services across 47 indicators that are relevant to investors and are based on financial performance, the quality of information disclosure to investors, the quality of the investor relations department and corporate governance. Financial performance is measured by profitability, asset quality, liquidity, capital adequacy and total shareholder return.

In terms of financial performance, PSBank was ranked 26th overall followed by Chinatrust (Philippines) Commercial Bank (ranked 33rd), Security Banking Corp. (54th), Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. (56th), China Banking Corp. (60th), City-state Savings Bank (63rd), Union Bank of the Philippines (73rd), Bank of the Philippine Islands (86th) Metropolitan Bank & Trust Co. (88th), Allied Banking Corp. (89th), Philippine National Bank (93rd), and Banco de Oro Unibank Inc. (105th).

In terms of being the most attractive banks in 2009, PSBank again topped the list of Philippine banks.

Asia Pacific’s most attractive banks to the global investor community were evaluated based on financial performance, quality of information disclosure, quality of the investor relations department and corporate governance.

The top 10 banks in the region came from: China (four banks), one from Indonesia, two from India, two from Thailand, and one from Malaysia.

According to the regional financial publication, the downturn in the Asia Pacific region has proven challenging for banks as financial performance has kept mature market banks out of the top 10 of the overall ranking.