Standard Chartered pays highest taxes
Abrar A. Anwar
More than one hundred ten years have elapsed since 1905 when British bank, Standard Chartered Bank (SCB), started operating banking services opening a branch in Chittagong’s Sadarghat. Then SCB opened another branch in Narayanganj (then in Dhaka district) in 1949 and a third branch in Khulna in 1952. Acquiring the businesses of the then ANZ Grindlays Bank and American Express in Bangladesh, Standard Chartered has turned into the largest international bank in Bangladesh.
Available statistics of the SCB of half a decade show that compared with all other local and foreign banks operating banking services in Bangladesh, SCB has been earning highest amount of profits and hence paying highest taxes to the government exchequer. Compared with other banks, SCB’s annual profit figures are double, treble, quadruple or even quintuple.
Unlike all other banks, SCB’s profit always increases successively. Its profit after tax increased from BDT 8,376,646119 crore in 2013 to 11,770,562210 crore in 2014-an increase of more than two and a half billion in one year.
About half a decade ago when the Managing Director of a local private bank was answering questions of journalists at a press conference held on the occasion of their anniversary function, I asked him why local banks lag behind SCB in respect of earning profit and paying taxes to the government. What the Managing Director replied was not at all convincing. “SCB gets huge funds for which it does not have to pay any interest, but we never get such funds,” he said.
Some four to five years ago, a popular vernacular daily that does not get any advertisement from SCB unethically made a front-page story headlined as “Protaranar Fad Petechhe Standard Chartered” (Standard Chartered has set a trap to cheat). Also, a couple of years ago the same daily made another front page news item accusing Standard Chartered Bank of the charges of its involvement in money laundering and helping clients to keep black money in Swiss Banks. There was no rejoinder from the Standard Chartered Bank following publication of the news items.
When I asked a senior official of the SCB why they did not protest against the news items, she said, “We sent rejoinders on both the occasions, but they did not publish those.” Readers can easily understand why the vernacular daily resorted to unethical and yellow journalism in respect of making fabricated news items about the SCB.
Abrar A. Anwar who took over as the new CEO of Standard Chartered Bank in Bangladesh replacing Jim McCabe from 1 January 2015 has 24 years of experience in international banking in Bangladesh, India and the UK.
His achievements include setting up of the first “Syndication and Structured Finance” business in Bangladesh (for the then ANZ Grindlays Bank), along with successful closure of milestone transactions in the Energy and Power, Infrastructure, Telecom, Aviation, Domestic and Export-oriented industries.
By I.H. Sharif
Available statistics of the SCB of half a decade show that compared with all other local and foreign banks operating banking services in Bangladesh, SCB has been earning highest amount of profits and hence paying highest taxes to the government exchequer. Compared with other banks, SCB’s annual profit figures are double, treble, quadruple or even quintuple.
Unlike all other banks, SCB’s profit always increases successively. Its profit after tax increased from BDT 8,376,646119 crore in 2013 to 11,770,562210 crore in 2014-an increase of more than two and a half billion in one year.
About half a decade ago when the Managing Director of a local private bank was answering questions of journalists at a press conference held on the occasion of their anniversary function, I asked him why local banks lag behind SCB in respect of earning profit and paying taxes to the government. What the Managing Director replied was not at all convincing. “SCB gets huge funds for which it does not have to pay any interest, but we never get such funds,” he said.
Some four to five years ago, a popular vernacular daily that does not get any advertisement from SCB unethically made a front-page story headlined as “Protaranar Fad Petechhe Standard Chartered” (Standard Chartered has set a trap to cheat). Also, a couple of years ago the same daily made another front page news item accusing Standard Chartered Bank of the charges of its involvement in money laundering and helping clients to keep black money in Swiss Banks. There was no rejoinder from the Standard Chartered Bank following publication of the news items.
When I asked a senior official of the SCB why they did not protest against the news items, she said, “We sent rejoinders on both the occasions, but they did not publish those.” Readers can easily understand why the vernacular daily resorted to unethical and yellow journalism in respect of making fabricated news items about the SCB.
Abrar A. Anwar who took over as the new CEO of Standard Chartered Bank in Bangladesh replacing Jim McCabe from 1 January 2015 has 24 years of experience in international banking in Bangladesh, India and the UK.
His achievements include setting up of the first “Syndication and Structured Finance” business in Bangladesh (for the then ANZ Grindlays Bank), along with successful closure of milestone transactions in the Energy and Power, Infrastructure, Telecom, Aviation, Domestic and Export-oriented industries.
By I.H. Sharif