BANGKOK: Krung Thai Bank, Thailand’s second-largest bank by assets, promoted Senior Executive Vice President Payong Srivanich to president on Tuesday. Payong, 48, has been the head of the global markets group since he joined the state-owned bank in 2015 and had over 20 years of experience in the banking industry before that. From 2008 to 2014, he was managing director and head of global markets and country treasurer at the Thai arm of Citibank.
His educational background includes studies in the U.S., where he earned an MBA from the University of Pittsburgh and a Bachelor of Science degree in industrial engineering from the University of Arizona. Like other state-owned enterprises, the bank had invited members of the public to apply for the president’s post but, according to local media, Payong was the only candidate. The appointment has been approved by the Bank of Thailand, the bank said in a statement.
Payong replaced Vorapak Tanyawong, who served for four years at the helm of the bank. Over his four years, Vorapak has been working on increasing the bank’s profitability through various measures such as salary reforms and strengthening digital banking operations. During Vorapak’s tenure, the bank was hit by huge loan defaults by Thailand’s largest steelmaker Sahaviriya Steel Industries, whose U.K. subsidiary was forced to liquidate. Krung Thai was one of the three lenders that had extended a combined 50 billion baht ($1.4 billion) in loans to the company and had to set aside 9 billion baht in loan-loss provisions, resulting in a 14% year-on-year decline in net profit for fiscal 2015.
The Thai economic recovery remains sluggish, and the bank has registered an increase of 29% in non-performing loans this year to date. Lending, meanwhile, fell 6%, as some state-owned clients made large repayments. It was the only one of the nation’s big four banks to post negative loan growth. Payong has already submitted a new business plan to the State Enterprise Policy Office, according to local media, and plans to steer the bank back into growth.
