Trade and Development Bank of Mongolia
A decade ago, private banking was all but unknown in Mongolia. Now, virtually every bank has at least one gleaming office in the capital, dedicated purely to serving the wealthy and their dependants. Golomt Bank offers an expanding repertoire of private banking services, as does the country’s biggest lender, Khan Bank, whose Priority and Signature services, launched in 2010, cater to more than 35,000 customers.
But TDB, one of Mongolia’s oldest lenders, again walks away with this award. Over the last year, it has opened up two new VIP branches – in the new Shangri-La Mall in central Ulaan Baatar, and in River Garden, an upscale neighbourhood to the south of the city – just as Randolph Koppa, executive vice-chairman and president promised last year.
The first onshore lender to offer proto-private banking services in 2004, TDB has more than 20% of the market, serving 330 individuals and families with personal assets of more than $200,000.
Even its peers acknowledge the bank’s pre-eminence. Notes the chief executive of another first-tier lender: “I’d like to nominate us for this award, but TDB is better than us.”
Each year the bank, under the stewardship of chief executive O. Orkhon and executive vice-chairman Randolph Koppa, finds new ways to innovate, hosting regular invitation-only events that deliver wealth management and risk management lessons to its loyal core of high and ultra-high net-worth individuals.
Private banking is never going to be big business here in absolute terms, but with the economy ticking along nicely in the wake of the IMF-led bailout in 2017, and with new entrepreneurs emerging to disrupt industries from banking to logistics and transport, it is certainly profitable and worth fighting over. And no lender is better at what it does than TDB.