As Bahrain’s banking sector continues to evolve, large focus is being placed on its digital transformation, shared Jean Christophe Durand, CEO of National Bank of Bahrain (NBB) in an interview with Arabian Business.
Last year, Bahrain unveiled a new economic growth plan targeting $30 billion of investments as it looks to shore up its economy from the repercussions of the pandemic and balance its budget by 2024.
The Arabian Gulf nation aims to create more than 20,000 jobs annually for citizens by 2024 and attract $2.5bn in foreign direct investment by 2023.
A relatively advanced digital infrastructure has done well to cushion Bahraini banks from the impact of Covid-19, with Bahrain’s largest state-backed bank NBB embracing digitisation as part of its renewed strategy.
“Whether it’s digitisation within our client channels, internal processes, or new products, the pandemic has greatly accelerated the digitisation trend for us,” Durand said.
Reflecting back on the onset of the pandemic, Durand stressed how important maintaining strong client relationships was for NBB, adding: “It was a time where bankers needed to be close to their clients to understand their challenges and guide them through it… they needed to ensure that their clients came out of the crisis in the best way possible.”
Digital banking initiatives
“This crisis has reinforced a new sense of cooperation with our clients…you could see that the nature of relationship with a client has changed,” he added.
NBB’s digitisation initiatives are facilitating its ambition to become a leading force in Bahrain’s banking sector.
“As a national bank, we want to ensure that all our clients are satisfied….so all our clients’ experiences has really been revolved around this digital transformation,” Durand said.
With that, NBB invested in a top of the range retail platform, in which he shared: “We invest for the future – we don’t do short term fixes or short term products. Our plan is to have a strong platform which we can scale up over a period of time by adding new products and features.”
Looking ahead into 2022 and beyond, Durand shared that NBB remains focused on elevating its retail and corporate digital platforms, cementing its position as a leading digital bank regionally.
“Digital services for all our clients, from retail to government to corporate, is our top priority – this is something we have invested in heavily and will continue to do so,” he said.
NBB’s strong retail banking proposition is also underpinned by its acquisition of Bahrain Islamic Bank (BisB), a bank that has played a pivotal role in the development of Bahrain’s Islamic banking sector.
“Our acquisition of BisB gives us the opportunity to not only to grow our market share in retail, but also to serve our clients who are Shariah-compliant,” Durand said.
The market share of Islamic banks in Bahrain is expected to increase in 2022 after reaching 37.1 percent of domestic banking system assets and 17.2 percent of total banking system assets (including foreign assets) at end-2020, according to a report by Fitch Ratings.
“This acquisition is not about purely creating synergies… a lot of acquisition happens, but it is to develop businesses together to ensure what we are doing in a conventional manner, we can do Shariah compliant way and vice versa, ensuring that we access all clients.”
Durand shared that NBB is also undertaking various ESG initiatives, having been ranked first in the kingdom and second in the Arab World for its commitment to sustainability, according to the Refinitiv Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Scores for Banking Services Companies.
“ESG is not a business, it’s something which we implement in every aspect of what we are doing, whether it’s how we manage staff, how we manage our stakeholders, how we try to finance environmentally friendly projects, or how we support education,” he said.
In 2021, NBB was the first in Bahrain to obtain the international accreditation for Environmental Management Systems, reinforcing its position as a financial leader in sustainability practices.
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