CEO’s Message
We had a very exciting year in 2022 where we were opening up after the pandemic with easing of travel restrictions. There were still some uncertainties due to the pandemic, especially, in the early part of the year. However, with multiple phases of vaccination drives from the government, social protection measures and digitalization initiatives of businesses, our economy remained strong and resilient. I am pleased to report that we continued to serve our members and fulfil our strategic and business objectives. The increased adoption of digitalization and data-driven decision-making in the financial industry provides a positive outlook for our future growth. It gives me immense pleasure to present some of the year’s major milestones and achievements.
As of December 2022, CBC was serving a member base of 185 financial institutions including commercial banks, specialized banks, microfinance institutions, leasing companies and rural credit institutions. We generated more than 6.4 million credit reports last year. Our credit reporting database contains credit activities and repayment histories of more than seven million consumers – representing more than 60% of the adult population in the country and more than 23,600 commercial entities with contributions from more than 75 member financial institutions reporting commercial data.
Since the onset of the pandemic, we enabled reporting and tracking COVID-19 related loan restructuring. As of December 2022, more than 671,000 loan accounts were restructured. 2022 was a very special year for us as we completed our journey of one decade of credit reporting in Cambodia. We expanded from 51 members to 181 members and 8 staff to more than 70. During this period, the Cambodian financial sector grew rapidly and I am pleased to express that CBC has been able to serve this growing industry with comprehensive and robust reporting, analytics and monitoring solutions.
This year, we launched Digital Real Estate Appraisal product that harnesses data-analytics and digitalization based property valuation for affordable, quick and reliable real estate appraisal for credit risk management for our member financial institutions. We saw rapid increase in the adoption of CBC Mobile as it completed two years of launch in November 2020. In the context of rapid digitalization in the country, CBC Mobile has been serving as a convenient platform for financial health check that can be accessed from anywhere anytime for consumers to stay on top of their financial health powered by digital KYC verification features.
We also enabled payment integration with Bakong platform to enable consumers with more convinient payment options. It is our key priority to enable every Cambodian to acces their own credit reports and stay on top of their financial health. There were a series of initiatives and activities we carried out in 2022 to strengthen financial inclusion in the country. The Lending Guidelines initiative which was implemented in the microfinance sector with support from CBC since 2016 was adopted in the Code of Conduct of the financial industry in 2022 to monitor supply-side risks of over-indebtedness. We also implemented multiple technical infrastructure and human capacity building programme to strengthen governance, reporting and risk management in rural credit institutions and microfinance institutions.
We believe in accelerating business growth by investing in our people, talent, boosting employee satisfaction and enabling them to serve our members and the society better. Our Employee Innovation Programme completed its second year of launch in 2022. Out of this open platform for all staff to contribute to the company’s growth, several innovation projects emerged that are being developed and operational. We continue to introduce accredited training and development programmes to improve staff competency while building a culture of continuous growth in all aspects of our business. As a fast growing and highly diversified credit bureau, we collaborated with the National Bank of Cambodia to host the Regional Credit Reporting Conference in November 2022. The conference drew international as well as local participants representing regulators, credit bureaus as well as financial institutions from the ASEAN region and the wider Asian region including Bhutan, Nepal, Pakistan, Korea, the United States, the United Kingdom and New Zealand. This conference offered an Asia level public-private platform to enable the players in the region to move towards cross-border credit reporting and risk management in an era of rapid digitalisation.
We also prioritized a number of initiatives in giving back to society for a sustainable future. We extended our corporate social responsibility efforts to supporting families affected the flood in Siem Reap by joining the relief efforts of the National Bank of Cambodia. Earlier in the year, we also joined the financial sector wide initiative to launch the blood donation campaign “Save My Life”. We also continued to collaborate with the Techo Startup Centre in advancing the Reverse Innovation programme to prepare next generation of young leaders who can employ analytics and digital technologies to solve complex business decision-making problems. To mark our 10th anniversary, we offered scholarships to the first batch of CBC Scholars in the Bachelor’s degree in Data Science and Engineering programme at the Royal University of Phnom Penh and the international Bachelor in Economics and Management at the Royal University of Law and Economics to provide holistic financial and career support to young graduates interested for a career in financial and fintech sectors.
Our operational resilience, infrastructural strength and acceleration towards digitalisation sets a strong foundation for the next phase of growth, ensuring the company is well-positioned for an innovation and growth roadmap to transform big data analytics and data-driven business decision-making landscape in the country. I am looking forward to leading our multifunctional and dynamic team in implementing our plans throughout 2023 and the years ahead. As we move into 2023, one of our key priorities will be diversifying data sources to harness both traditional and alternative data and enabling cross-border credit reporting to support our members to adopt broader tools and data sources to conduct credit risk management and frictionless data driven decision-making. Along with new data sources, we are also enhancing our advanced data analytics capabilities to develop a continuous stream of credit reporting and Value Added Services in response to the needs of our members.
Before I conclude, I would like to extend my deepest gratitude for the invaluable guidance provided by the Board of Directors, the National Bank of Cambodia and the International Finance Corporation. I would also like to express my appreciation for the continuous support and collaboration from the key financial sector industry associations – Association of Banks in Cambodia and Cambodia Microfinance Association. I am also grateful to all member institutions, business partners and individual consumers for their continued trust and support. And last but not the least, I wish to acknowledge our employees or their commitment, energy and valuable drive towards continuously improving our capabilities and pushing forward as one CBC Team.
Oeur Sothearoath
Chief Executive Officer
