Standard Chartered’s (STAN.L) consumer banking group, which has been aggressively expanding its private and priority banking operations, is now turning to the SME business which it hopes to double in the next three years, its CEO said on Monday.

The UK-based emerging markets-focused lender aims to hire 1,200 relationship managers to serve small and medium enterprises in the next three years, and will offer a broader range of services such as managing foreign exchange risks and coping with volatile commodity prices. 

 

“Almost everything we are trying to do, we want to double,” Stanchart’s CEO for global consumer banking Steve Bertamini told Reuters in an interview.

 

Stanchart has been a beneficiary of the global financial crisis, which led to the collapse or government-led bailouts of many larger rivals. Its five-year old private bank is already a big player in Asia while its priority banking business saw a doubling in new customers last year.

 

In August, the UK bank said it will try to further grow its wealth management business by hiring around 800 bankers for a new service aimed at affluent Asians who do not qualify for priority banking services. 

 

Stanchart said its expansion plan involved trying to find synergies among its different businesses to win new clients as well as offer existing customers a broader range of services.

 

"We’re not just trying to bank the SMEs but we’re trying to bank the owner as well," Bertamini said, referring to the synergy between private banking and SMEs. 

 

"When an SME customer gets larger, it’s a natural transition to get them into wholesale. Likewise many large wholesale clients have small supply chain clients which are in the SME sector," he added.

 

Stanchart’s consumer banking business, which includes the private bank and SME business, reported a 24% rise in operating profit to US$643 million ($845 million) in the first six months of this year. 

 

Its wholesale bank, which handles larger corporate clients and investment banking, saw operating profit jump 35% to US$2.5 billion.

 

Bertamini said SMEs grew at twice the rate of GDP expansion and Stanchart can enjoy a “pretty decent low-teens continued growth rate” by focusing on SMEs and trying to grow faster than the overall market.

 

Subroto Som, Stanchart’s global head of SME banking, said the planned hiring of 1,200 relationship managers will boost the number of RMs serving SMEs to about 2,500.

 

“We see more SMEs expanding cross-borders or their suppliers or distributors being in some other countries- that ability to bank and do financial business across borders is a key need,” he said.

 

Stanchart saw deposits from SMEs grow 17% in the first half of 2010 while loans to the sector rose by 7%.