Shanghai-born Tsien, 65, is known for pursuing acquisitions that led to the Singapore lender’s expansion in Hong Kong and made it a top-10 private bank in Asia. OCBC’s local rivals have also given insights into management succession, with United Overseas Bank’s boss recently expressing an openness to considering people from outside the founding family and DBS Group Holdings grooming leaders from within the bank.
SINGAPORE (Nov 26): Samuel Tsien, in his eighth year as chief executive officer at Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp, signalled he favours internal candidates over external ones to succeed him when the time comes.
“We have internal candidates who are strong candidates, who have moved around in different functions, who are able to take over the bank in the event of a need,” Tsien said in an interview, without giving names.
