Participation Cambodia Deposit Taking

January 2011 - Triple Jump’s partner Hattha Kaksekar Limited (HKL) has opened a new head office in Phnom Penh. "This shows that HKL has entered into a new stage of our development: HKL is now a deposit taking institution", says Triple Jump’s Erik Geurts (Chair of the Board of HKL) on the occasion of the opening of the new Head Office of HKL Phnom Penh. Find Erik's speech below.

SPEECH

Mr. Erik Peter Geurts , Chairman of board director of
Hattha Kaksekar Limited in the occasion of ribbon cutting ceremony
of Hattha Kaksekar Limited’s Head Office Building on 06 January 2010,
in Phnom Penh

- Excellency Chea Chanto, Governor of National Bank of Cambodia.
- Excellency Noun Someth, Deputy Governor of Phnom Penh capital city.
- Excellency SUN Kunthor, Precident and CEO of RDB.
- Distinguished guests, Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, friends of the Cambodian micro finance industry and members of the press.
- All beloved Hattha Kaksekar Limited’s staffs.

We are very happy that all of you have come to the opening ceremony of our new building. Of course we are glad that staff and management have now a proper working space. However this building means more to us. It is also a symbol for all of our present and future stakeholders: It shows to our employees, clients, Regulators, financiers and colleagues that we have entered into a new stage of our development. We are now a deposit taking institution.

As you know we have been founded in Pursat. Although we also offer our services in Phnom Penh, our management and staff have never lost base with the interior of the country. We feel that there is a real need for tailor made financial services outside the capital city. Increasingly our customers require more products than loans. Therefore we plan to offer them other products like saving deposits and insurance. We want to help our customers to cope with the many uncertainties in their lives. We sincerely think that the micro entrepreneurs in the country side lack a choice of competitive possibilities to save. The deposit taking license we received from the NBC will allow us to address this need of our clients.

Board and management of HKL have been preparing this important new stage in a prudent way. We have been implementing a new risk management system which is totally adjusted to our scale of operations. This is but one of the ways in which board, management and shareholders wish to assure customers and other stakeholders that HKL is a safe place to deposit their money. HKL is a solid microfinance institution with shareholders that are well known in the international development finance scene. Other strong institutional investors have shown an interest in becoming shareholder of HKL. Our core business is managed by well trained loan officers and branch managers. They can count on good administrative back up in the branches and the Head Quarters.

The board combines international expertise in finance and micro finance with profound knowledge of the National environment. To strengthen the Cambodian character of the company we appointed this year a Cambodian independent board member with expertise in national banking and commercial banking sector.

Of course we cannot close our eyes for the events of last year when the global financial crisis hit Cambodia. As all colleagues will acknowledge the micro finance industry did not escape the crisis. Nonetheless we also conclude that the micro finance industry has proven to be resilient. Its swift recovery has been remarkable. In our case we took the opportunity to learn and improve. To mention an example: We hired consultants to improve relationship management with our customers.

The idea is to make sure that our customers feel comfortable with HKL because we can fulfill all their financial needs. By providing the customers with the financial services they really need we want to make sure that they will not need to look for additional loans and become over indebted. By the way, HKL is also one of the pioneers to include micro finance into the new Credit Bureau. To that end HKL will make an investment in the Credit Bureau. We feel that the new Credit Bureau has to be up and running as soon as possible to make sure that clients do not get over indebted. The improvement and well being of our customers is the central part of our mission.

To that end we see it as an obligation to increase economies of scale that will reduce costs and add new products that fulfill the requirements of micro, small and medium sized entrepreneurs throughout the whole country. Board and management do not exclude the possibility of becoming a bank, once we will have reached the proper scale to do so.

While we have large plans on the horizon we remain standing with our feet in Cambodian reality. We will never leave our natural market segment and stick to our social mission. We will grow together with our customers and provide them with services that really add value to their businesses and families.

Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your attention.