“Compliance officers have a lot of powers now. The joke between bankers is that they are running the banks.”
“After a streak of eight years of positive double-digit growth in net profits, the environment is now more difficult for bank profitability. It is true that banks are still growing and standing very good in terms of liquidity, asset quality, capital adequacy and risk coverage but the level of profitability has been adversely affected by the operating environment.”
“You can not take these deposits and say I want to reduce exposure to the Lebanese sovereign to zero percent and place all my money in international markets, you will lose. You cannot convince a depositor by saying, ‘I’m an international bank, I don’t invest with the government, all my money is outside of Lebanon’. Will he accept to be paid a 1 percent deposit rate? Would you put your money with us?”
“In the past, banks internationally made money by taking in lots of risks, which is now forbidden. So banks have to become utilities. The decision has been taken by regulators worldwide. The real business for banks is to take deposits, lend the money, support the economy and provide services. It is going to be very challenging. Competition will be much tougher.”
“Banks are the police today. Our job is to know more about our clients than we did 20 or 30 years ago and to make sure they are not conducting transactions on behalf of other undisclosed persons. We have to do as much as we can. It is a challenging and difficult job.”
“We have sought and are currently seeking new sources of revenue to maximize our profitability levels. Some of these sources are traditional and within industry norms, such as fees and commissions, and others are more creative and, frankly speaking, out of the box.”
“A higher interest rate would give comfort to the banks to take on more government debt; but if [the government] wants to try to decrease the rate further, it will be against the benefit of the government. Banks will stop buying risk on the republic. Government should understand that they should increase the rate to a bit of a higher level.”
“There have been talks about a new world order… a shift in the balance of economic and financial power, from West to East. This could also be translated into companies that have businesses linked to the East. Such firms will need safe and secure access to international markets, especially through trade finance to support their expansion.”
