London, 17^th February 2004 - Philippine National Bank (PNB) has selected OPICS, the treasury, derivatives and capital markets solution from Misys Wholesale Banking Systems, to continue the improvement of its IT infrastructure by reducing risk and increasing efficiency.

PNB, one of the top 10 banks in the Philippines, is a commercial bank currently focusing on its retail business, while strongly maintaining its leadership in the overseas remittance business. The OPICS solution is expected to bolster its treasury operations in both these key business areas, and to suitably address its requirements to grow the treasury department.

The bank's anticipated improvements in its treasury operations include higher efficiency and accuracy in the front, middle and back office; enhanced and smoother transaction flow; better risk management through volume and stop-loss limits; and inventory management of securities.

By improving transaction processing, OPICS is also expected to allow traders to concentrate more on providing their customers with enhanced services, thereby optimising their time. The OPICS solution will also support PNB's future plans for building retail fixed income business.

PNB's EVP and Treasury Head Asterio Favis Jr. comments: "Following a stringent evaluation process of three vendors, over a seven-month period, our bank concluded that Misys best fulfilled all our requirements for functionality, local track record, strong and reliable support, and the ability to provide a localised Filipino solution."

The localisation of the solution was one of the most important criteria for the bank during the selection process. With an enviable market share in the Philippines, OPICS provides features that comply with the specific requirements of both the local financial institutions and the central bank, for example, in the area of taxation and reporting. OPICS is instrumental in allowing banks to create and offer innovative new instruments and services to their clients on a regular basis.

K.K. Grover, Misys Wholesale Banking Systems' Country Manager for Philippines comments:"We are proud to be working with Philippines National Bank on this exciting project and are delighted to have OPICS once again voted the treasury, derivatives and capital markets solution of choice in the Philippines. We look forward to working with the bank to achieve the objectives of the project and a fast return on their investment."

Sara Toal / Adelaide Harrison
Write Image
+44 (0)20 7959 5400
sara@write-image.co.uk / adelaide.harrison@write-image.co.uk

 

Andy Coulter
Head of business planning

Misys Wholesale Banking Systems
+44 (0)20 8486 1188

The Philippine National Bank provides a full range of banking and other financial services to corporate, middle-market and retail customers in the Philippines as well as to the Philippine National Government, national Government agencies ("NGAs"), local national Government units ("LGUs") and government-owned and controlled corporations ("GOCCs"). While the Bank's principal market has historically been serving the banking needs of government-related entities and GOCCs, the Bank';s strategic focus going forward is to further develop its banking services to cater for corporate middle-market and retail customers.

As at 30^th September 2003, the Bank was the fifth largest domestic commercial bank in the Philippines in terms of both total assets and domestic branches, with total assets of P199.7 billion and 324 branches located throughout the Philippines. The Bank has the largest overseas network among Philippine banks with branches, representative offices, remittance centres and subsidiaries in over 90 locations spanning the United States, Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

The Bank's principal commercial banking services include deposit-taking, lending, bills discounting and foreign exchange dealings as well as fund transfers and remittance services. In addition, the Bank offers customers a full range of retail banking and trust services, treasury products and trade finance services. Through its subsidiaries and overseas offices, the Bank provides additional banking services, including remittance services, in many of the world's financial centres as well as full-service banking in London, New York, Tokyo, Singapore and Hong Kong.

Misys Wholesale Banking Systems is a trusted provider of innovative technology solutions. Over 1,000 employees in 30 offices around the world have built up the necessary domain expertise to deliver world-class solutions with an understanding of local requirements. Misys Wholesale Banking Systems' staff are committed to developing and supporting a product family that embraces trade finance, international banking, treasury & capital markets, confirmation matching, continuous linked settlement (CLS), eBanking, middleware and financial messaging.

Misys Wholesale Banking Systems is part of Misys plc's Banking & Securities Division, which serves over 1,200 customers across more than 120 countries, including 92% of the world's top 50 banks and 56% of the top 250. (Source: The Banker, July 2003).

Misys plc, one of the world's largest software solutions companies, serves customers in the international banking and securities, US healthcare, and UK retail financial services sectors. Employing over 6,500 staff, Misys reported revenues in excess of £1 billion ($1.5 billion) for the year ended 31 May 2003.

OPICS is Misys Wholesale Banking Systems' end-to-end solution for treasury, derivatives and capital markets. OPICS provides STP and real-time information across a wide array of globally traded instruments, including Internet trading.  Support features include cash management, analytics, customer credit, nostro management, confirmation matching, cross product netting and Continuous Linked Settlement (CLS) processing. OPICS is also provided with comprehensive Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) to enable data transfer with third party systems.