OUR EVALUATION CRITERIA
The following are our core “Belief Statements” for each of the awards in this category. Each Belief Statement can be broken down into its elements, which are in turn made up of the quantifiable data that we look for in our audit document and interviews.
All our scorecards are based on a belief statement that encapsulates all the dimensions required to run this programme well. This belief statement is then broken down into components and then set out by identifying quantifiable performance indicators that we can use as proxy to evaluate your institution's achievements.
The questions that we ask in the subsequent pages related to the completion of the scorecard will also give us a good overview of your businesses at the micro-level in your country, at the market level between your competitors and at the street level inside your organisation.
These are then published in selecting the winners as a form of transparent assessment, that can also be used to discuss the basis from which we arrive at our conclusion. These insights are also used to benchmark players and discover GAP analysis in future assessments.
BEST RETAIL BANK (Globally, by Region, by Country )
THE SCORECARD
We believe that the best retail bank is based on the premise that demonstrates a long-term sustainable franchise, based on strong business processes that leads to a consistent and profitable performance. It recognises financial institutions for their vision, execution and market leading propositions that make a positive impact to their business and the local consumers.
This belief statement is then broken down into 10 components and then set out by identifying quantifiable and qualitatitve data that we can use as proxy to evaluate your institution's achievements.
The Excellence Scorecard is used to evaluate financial institutions for both country and regional basis for the Excellence in Retail Financial Services Programme. It is the backbone of the evaluation process and was developed with an eye on one of the key objectives of the programme, which is to create an instrument that is accepted by the player in the retail financial services industry as a viable, objective and representative measure of an institution's performance across multiple areas.
For the 2023 programme we added the financial comittment in building the retail banking franchise by looking at retail capital expenditure under the corporate strategy dimension
In our assessment of best retail banks, the following are the dimensions that we look at and the percentage we give to each of them. We exclude the SME banking and the private banking business in the key performance indicators
Evaluation Scorecard for The Best Retail Bank:
| Dimension | What we want to see | Weight | Indicator |
|---|---|---|---|
| Consistent Financial Performance | We want to see sustainable growth, profitability but not at the expense of good management of costs | 15% | |
Corporate Strategy | We want to see the ability to articulate a strategy to which we are able to connect the quantifiable performance figures to a long term and achievable story | 10% | |
Digital Journey | We will assess where your institution is in the digital journey | 15% | |
| Brand | We want to assess the brand promise that your institution enjoys in your marketplace. | 10% | |
| Sales Capability | We want to see how large, powerful and organised your sales capability is | 10% | |
Customer Experience | We want to know if your customers love you more than your competitor through their experiences of basic services | 15% | |
| Risk Management | The ability to take on risks and price them in a managed manner. | 5% | |
| Process and Technology | We want to know that your technology infrastructure is keeping up with the times by your ability to respond to competition quickly | 10% | |
| People and Organisation | We want to know if you have a mixture of incumbent and new blood in the organisation and how resourceful you are deploying your personnel | 5% | |
| Achievement in Year under Review | State to us the achievements in your retail business in the year under review that has not been captured in the static data above | 5% | |
| Source: The Asian Banker | |||
| To access the retail bank ranking click here | |||
BEST DIGITAL BANKING SERVICE
We believe that the best digital banking service by commercial banks has demonstrated exceptional effort and mastery in the industry by going beyond digitising products, and services, while also transforming the entire franchise through focus on organisational agility and simplification, brand equity, and overall consumer experience.
This belief statement is broken down into components and then set out by identifying quantifiable performance indicators that we can use as proxy to evaluate your institution's achievements.
In our assessment of the best digital banking services by commercial banks, the following are the dimensions that we look at, the indicators that define those dimensions, and the percentage we give to each of these dimensions.
Evaluation Scorecard for The Best Digital Banking Service:
| Dimension | What we want to see | Weight | Indicator |
|---|---|---|---|
| Digital Transformation Journey | We want to see the ability to articulate a digital journey strategy to which we are able to connect the quantifiable performance figures to a long term and achievable digital story | 15% | |
| Financial Performance | We want to see sustainable growth, profitability but not at the expense of good management of costs | 20% | |
| Digital Customer | We want to see how fast you were able to scale up your digital customer base and how digitally engaged they are | 10% | |
| Digital Brand | We want to assess the digital brand promise that your institution enjoys in your marketplace. | 10% | |
| Digital Sales Capability | We want to see how large, powerful your digital sales capability is | 10% | |
| Open Banking Capabilties | We want to see whether you can collaborate well with other ecosystem players | 10% | |
| Big Data | We want to see the big data capabilities and how this gives you a competitive edge in today's market place | 10% | |
| Technology and Processes | We want to know that your technology infrastructure has the ability to respond to competition quickly | 10% | |
| Achievement in Year under Review | State to us the digital achievements in your retail business in the year under review that has not been captured in the static data above | 5% | |
| Source: The Asian Banker | |||
BEST DIGITAL-ONLY BANK
We believe that the best digital-only banks not only grow their user base to scale, but offer a broad scope of products and services, have a clear path to profitability and have a balanced loan and deposit growth. They are also able to continuously attract VC funding from the investor community.
This category focuses on the first and second generation digital-only banks that operate independently of traditional commercial banks and offer a unique virtual customer experience.
We also include digital banks that have very limited physical outlets or hubs. The differentiation to traditional banks is that the physical location is integral to the experience of its digital users, are non-transactional and do not serve non-digital customers. We also include digital banking services of commercial banks only if they are stand-alone operations or subsidiaries. While majority owned by commercial banks, this type of digital banks has separate brands, onboarding processes, products and services that are designed only for their unique users/customers and are not available to other customers of their parent banks. This is different from mobile digital banking apps which can be used by all customers of the parent banks.
In our assessment of the best digital-only banks, the following are the dimensions that we look at, the indicators that define those dimensions, and the percentage we give to each of these dimensions.
Evaluation Scorecard for The Best Digital-Only Bank:
| Dimension | What we want to see | Weight | Indicator |
|---|---|---|---|
| Customer | We want to see whether you can scale your customer base | 30% | |
| Coverage | We want to know your market coverage and product scope | 10% | |
| Financials | We want to see whether you are profitable and able to generate strong top line growth | 30% | |
| Balance sheet | We want to see a balanced book | 20% | |
| Funding | We want to see a srong investor commitment or regsistered capital base | 10% | |
| Source: The Asian Banker | |||
| For the global top100 digital-only banks ranking click here | |||
BEST SME BANK
We believe that the best SME Bank brings the full suite of solutions across the banks franchise to serve the needs of medium and small enterprises in regards to core financial needs, stakeholder needs of owners and employees, and offers flexible financing options across the entire lifecycle needs of the business. This is supported by well-defined value propositions around each industry vertical, digitisation of the bank’s processes and financing options, and a strong relationship banking approach in the larger enterprise segment to create best in class customer engagement. Leading banks offer not only increasingly an integrated product and service platform which enables their clients to create additional value by helping their business grow and lowering their operational cost, but also help a growing portion of their clients to expand in regional and overseas markets.
This belief statement is broken down into components and then set out by identifying quantifiable performance indicators that we can use as proxy to evaluate your institution's achievements.
In our assessment of Best SME Bank, the following are the dimensions that we look at, the indicators that define those dimensions, and the percentage we give to each of these dimensions.
Evaluation Scorecard for The Best SME Bank:
| Dimension | What we want to see | Weight | Indicator |
|---|---|---|---|
| Organisation | We want to know how strong SME banking is in your financial institution. | 20% | |
| Customer | We want to know if your customers value you more than your competitor through their experiences of basic services. | 20% | |
| Financial Performance | We want to see whether the ability to articulate a coherent strategy can be connected to quantifiable performance figures to a long term and achievable story. | 20% | |
| Risk | The ability to take on risks and price them in a managed manner. | 15% | |
| Technology and Operations | We want to know that your technology infrastructure is keeping up with the times. | 15% | |
| Achievement in Year under Review | State to us any achievement in the year under review that has not been captured in the above dimensions. | 10% | |
| Source: The Asian Banker | |||
BEST WEALTH MANAGEMENT BANK
We believe that wealth management is defined by the total size and type of assets under management, the ability to convert strong relationship management capabilities to sell proprietary and third-party products and services, and the ability to capture a sizeable wallet-share of the affluent customer with investible assets between $100K-$700K depending on markets and supported by a well-branded service and technological capability to execute. Wealth management is defined as business from the affluent segment. It does not include private banking and the emerging affluent segment.
This belief statement is broken down into components and then set out by identifying quantifiable performance indicators that we can use as proxy to evaluate your institution's achievements.
In our assessment of Best Wealth Management Bank, the following are the dimensions that we look at, the indicators that define those dimensions, and the percentage we give to each of these dimensions.
Evaluation Scorecard for The Best Wealth Management Bank:
| Dimension | What we want to see | Weight | Indicator |
|---|---|---|---|
| Business Strategy | We want to know whether a coherent wealth strategy can be formulated. | 20% | |
| Asset under Management | We want to see whether you are a strong wealth management player in your market | 20% | |
| Financial Performance | We want to see sustainable growth, profitability but not at the expense of good management of costs | 15% | |
| Customer | We want to know if your customers value you more than your competitor through their experiences of wealth management services. | 15% | |
| Advisory and Data Support | We want to know how much progress you made from a product to an advisory centric business model | 20% | |
| Sales Management | We want to know your sales capabilities | 10% | |
| Source: The Asian Banker | |||
