Al Rajhi Bank - Saudi Arabia

COMPANY DESCRIPTION

The largest banking institution in Saudi Arabia, Al Rajhi Bank has defied the downturn so far this year, posting an 8.1 percent first quarter profit gain as the Kingdom’s central bank cut interest rates to improve liquidity and lowered funding costs.

Founded in 1957, Al Rajhi Bank is one of the largest Islamic banks in the world with an employee base of over 8,000 associates. It has a vast network of over 400 branches, over 100 dedicated ladies branches, 2,000 ATMs, 15,000 point of sale (POS) terminals installed with merchants and the largest customer base of any bank in the Kingdom. The first men’s branch was opened in Aldirah in 1957, with the first ladies branch being opened in Alshmaisi in 1979.

Today, the Islamic bank is a committed pioneer of new technology, and in January announced that it is installing advanced Automatic Teller Machines (ATMs) across Saudi that accept chip-cards based on international standards. Visa operates the world’s largest retail electronic payments network and has provided technical and consultancy support for the installation, which will enable all Visa chip card transactions to take place using the chip on the card rather than the less secure magnetic stripe at any of the ATMs.