KUALA LUMPUR: RHB Bank Bhd is targeting for 50,000 new account holders for its newly launched online deposit accounts, RHB Smart Account and RHB Smart Account-i, within six months from April this year.
The RHB Smart Account is a conventional account, while the RHB Smart Account-i is its Islamic counterpart, structured under the Commodity Murabahah concept.
Its Executive Director Group Retail Banking, U Chen Hock said at the press conference earlier today that the bank has garnered a RM7 million account balance for both products within the soft launch period of Jan 9 to Feb 26, 2017.
“Of the current RM7 million, 15 per cent were new account customers and the rest, RHB bank staff,” said U.
“For the official launch next month, we are targeting to register an average of RM3,000 account balance per customer.”
The RHB Smart Account and RHB Smart Account-i are accounts that can be opened online and will reward a customer based on the banking transaction that the customer performs.
Both accounts offer customers attractive returns of three per cent per annum +one per cent bonus pay-outs when they save, pay bills online, spend and invest with RHB.
The bonus pay-out however is capped at up to RM100,000 monthly account balance. It should be noted that the one per cent bonus pay-out is on the investment amount and not account balance.
“The RHB Smart Account complements customers increasing inclination to use the Internet and mobile devices for their banking and financial needs. As of January 2017, the total number of users has grown to 2.24 million,” added U.
The group had just last week reported a slight rise in its net profit for the financial year ended December 31, 2016 to RM1.68 billion, supported by net fund-based income growth of 3.1 per cent to RM4.3 billion on the back of two per cent growth in loans and financing.
Islamic banking continued its growth momentum, contributing 24.8 per cent of total domestic gross loans and financing compared with 23 per cent in December 2015.
The group’s retail banking segment remains its biggest contributor, despite a 4.4 per cent drop in its pre-tax profit to RM1.1 billion.