Dutch Bangla Bank - Banking

Banking

After instability and frequent management changes in its initial years, DBBL overcame these obstacles to establish rapid growth since the year 2000. The bank grew its reputation through social work rather than profits. The bank's conservative nature, long-term strategies, hefty social donations and technology investments have always led to modest but steady profits. DBBL has been known to be overly conservative in its banking practices. Much of the success and strategy has been attributed to the leadership of the founder chairman, M Sahabuddin Ahmed.

Despite being the largest corporate donor in Bangladesh, investor confidence was unhindered. In March 2008, DBBL share prices reached Tk. 14325.80 in the Dhaka Stock Exchange, setting the record for the highest stock price in the history of Bangladesh. It is also one of the few banks that does not participate in merchant/investment banking (which can lead to sporadic growth).

Dutch Bangla Bank is noted to be the first and only local bank in Bangladesh to have an automated banking system. The bank has spent over BDT 2 Billion in automation upgrades (first bank in Bangladesh to do so). This automation took place in 2003 whereby services of the bank were available uniformly though any branch, ATM and internet. Banking was a paper based until DBBL, with its wide local network, delivered banking automation and modern banking services to the masses. This effectively introduced the 'plastic money' concept into the Bangladeshi society. The entire automation system was imported and is the most expensive banking related IT project in Bangladesh.

The ATM count stood at 140 eclipsing other networks by a large margin. This rapid increase in DBBL's ATM network has led the majority of other banks to sign sharing agreements instead of pursuing their own ATM network.

In 2006, Dutch Bangla Bank ventured into the realm of personal credit by offering automatic credit facilities to its Debit card (DBBL Nexus) holders. It also continued expanding its ATM network with the intention of installing more than 400 machines, even though it is widely believed that the ATM division will not break even and is a setback to the profit margins.

In 2007 the bank entered a strategic alliance with Citibank NA, where both parties will provide retail banking services of DBBL for its employees and owners of Citibank corporate customers in Bangladesh. In the same year DBBL became the first bank in Bangladesh to offer SMS Banking services.

DBBL maintained a proprietary policy on its ATM network until 2007. This was changed when DBBL and Standard Chartered Bank (SCB) signed an agreement that will let SCB use DBBL's ATM network. Thus ending the unhealthy competition between the organizations. This sharing invitation was extended to all other banks shortly after. Number of DBBL ATMs eclipsed the 200 mark.

In 2010 most sharing agreements with foreign banks have been abruptly rendered invalid due Visa card's new policies enforced upon DBBL. In response to Visa's decision to terminate its ATM facilities with DBBL, Unionpay approached DBBL to convert all the retail network to accept Unionpay cards. DBBL and Unionpay have decided for a major nationwide launch to make Unionpay the single largest card issuer in Bangladesh.