Financial planning

SACOMBANK yesterday announced the launch of its new subsidiary, the 100 per cent foreign-owned Sacombank Cambodia Plc, which is set to target the Kingdom’s rural population. The Vietnamese commercial bank plans to open branches throughout the country’s provinces to provide banking services to a larger cross-section of Cambodia, Sacombank Cambodia vice president Nguyen Minh Tam told the Post yesterday. “We plan to focus on different customers to other banks and many kinds of sectors, but we’ll focus especially on SMEs in the provinces,” he said. Although Sacombank has had a presence in the Kingdom since June 2009, the bank will now operate as a Cambodian-registered bank under the legal jurisdiction of the Kingdom of Cambodia after receiving approval from the National Bank of Cambodia. The bank’s proposed reach in the countryside will allow more communities in the rural area to benefit from the bank’s remittance services, Nguyen Minh Tam said. “We are looking to expand our network rapidly in Cambodia. Sometimes local banks face difficulties and it could take a few days to transfer money abroad, but as we have systems in Vietnam and Laos, we are able to send remittances much faster.”