Retailers are now a major force in banking: banks are using retail techniques to attract customers and hiring people from the retail sector to help them develop mass-market appeal; and some big retailers have established themselves as competent purveyors of financial services. Michael Imeson reports.
In today’s environment, where news reports of consumer-related phishing attacks are a daily occurrence, banks’ retail banking units might examine the experience of their counterparts in corporate electronic banking, which have managed either largely to avoid instances of significant financial loss as a result of unauthorised access to corporate electronic banking systems since 1994 or to keep such incidents private.
Adel El-Labban, CEO of Bahrain’s Ahli United Bank, talks to Stephen Timewell about progress on his plans for a pan-Gulf retail network. Most banks in the six states of the increasingly rich Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have tended to focus on their domestic markets and as a result remained relatively small compared with the region’s enormous wealth. But now a few are breaking through traditional barriers, creating regional networks and realising some of the Gulf’s potential.Bahrain’s Ahli United Bank (AUB) has been a pioneer of mergers and acquisitions in the Gulf and this remains central to the bank’s strategy.