Anton Arumugam, 
Vice President - Trade Sales & Institutional Business, DFCC Bank 

By Nishel Fernando

With a legacy spanning across 65 years as one of Sri Lanka’s top-most financial conglomerates with a product portfolio consisting of a broad-range of commercial and development banking services, DFCC Bank offers a variety of foreign exchange products to its clientele across the globe. 

In particular, DFCC Bank has become a key driver of the national agenda to attract foreign exchange inflows into the country amidst the challenges brought by the COVID-19 pandemic. The Bank has given a top priority to promote and create awareness on Special Deposit Account (SDA) proposition introduced by the government and the Central Bank (CB). 

DFCC Bank, Vice President- Trade Sales & Institutional Business, Anton Arumugam recently joined Daily Mirror for a brief discussion on its foreign currency product and service offering to its customers while touching on some of key efforts launched by the Bank to support the country’s national agenda in increasing non-debt creating foreign exchange inflows to the country.

Following are the excerpts of the discussion: 

Q: What are the key foreign currency products offered to DFCC Bank customers?

We have all products In our portfolio to facilitate foreign currency transactions of exporters, importers, corporates, individuals and even minors. Our export financing facilitates are offered based on export cycles of clients and facilities are structured accordingly. 

In particular, we offer highest interest rates for our foreign currency saving deposit products to attract foreign exchange inflows from corporates and individuals. We open all types of foreign currency accounts such as Personal Foreign Currency Accounts (PFCA), Business Foreign Currency Accounts (BFCA) offering high interest up to four percent to our savings accounts which are highly attractive in the prevailing market.

Q: What is DFCC Bank’s historical and current contribution in terms of facilitating foreign exchange inflows into the country?

We have generated a significant amount of deposits under the Special Deposit Account (SDA) proposition. With 65 years of experience as a prominent and respected player in the banking industry, there is a confidence among the customers towards the bank. Majority of the investors are in fact new clients to the bank which shows the trust-based relationship that have been built over the period of time. 

Furthermore, we also pay an additional two Rupees for every USD converted to Rupees in inward Worker’s remittances as part of the Government’s initiative to encourage more foreign currency inflows.

Q: What has been reception for Special Deposit Account (SDA) introduced by the government from DFCC clientele?

DFCC bank was one of the first banks to launch the SDA shortly after the Central Bank (CB) guidelines were issued. The product was promoted on various platforms, digital and social media channels in order to encourage Sri Lankans residing overseas to invest their funds back into the country. 

I would say the response we received so far has been very encouraging with many customers from various countries across the world opening SDA accounts with DFCC in investing their funds.

Q: The government recently extended the validity of SDA opening period by another one year. What are  some of steps taken to promote the SDA among DFCC’s existing clientele and potential new customers?

As I mentioned, we have undertaken multi-platform approach to promote and create awareness of SDAs. Accordingly, we implemented a series of social media and digital based activities targeting the potential clients.

As a part of our broad-based efforts, we also launched a campaign circulating customised E- flyers among embassy’s and professional bodies (eg: CA Sri Lanka). Along with this, we also kicked off a fully-fledged digital marketing campaign on social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and LinkedIn.

We also organised WhatsApp campaigns and SMS campaigns targeting overseas Old Boys/Girls Associations of selected schools as well as targeting potential client segments including in professional bodies while utilising various databases.

Further, a series of webinars were conducted for members of Professional Associations to create more awareness on SDA. A special video on SDA was prepared featuring our CEO and it was circulated on social media to create more awareness of the product among Sri Lankan expatriates. Moreover, our CEO personally conducted a live programme online to participants from several countries promoting the SDA and the response was overwhelming.

As a result of these dedicated campaigns and activities, we have been able to attract a large sum of funds to SDAs from overseas. 

Q: What’s DFCC Bank’s role in export financing? 

Growing exports is a very important factor in the country’s development as it brings numerous benefits to the nation in terms of foreign exchange inflows, employment opportunities and economic stability. 

In recognising this, we offer a wide range of export financing facilities catering to the various requirements of our exporters. In particular, we extend customised financing and tariff for exporters in different sectors. We carry out sector wise analysis of exporters in detail and develop our propositions accordingly. For an example, after identifying the need to assist cinnamon exporters, we undertook a series of comprehensive efforts and consequently we were successful in onboarding all leading cinnamon exporters to DFCC Bank.

Especially, SME sector remains a priority sector for us along with Start-ups and Female-led enterprise.  We offer sector requirement facilities at concessionary interest rates to promote their product offering to their targeted global clientele. 

Q: How has the pandemic impacted DFCC Bank’s foreign exchange operations?

Despite the challenges posed by the Pandemic, DFCC bank was able to carry out the foreign exchange operations very smoothly and efficiently with the availability and accessibility of various digital platforms introduced to the customers to open accounts and remit funds while complying with the relevant requirements.

We also recently introduced our Non-Face to Face (NF2F) digital account opening process which includes video verification using the “DFCC Video Chatz “video banking service hosted on the bank’s cutting-edge trilingual website. Based on the recent guidelines issued by the Central Bank (CB), DFCC Bank has developed this fully integrated and seamless customer onboarding process which allows customers to open accounts digitally online including Foreign Currency Accounts and Special Deposit Accounts (SDA) without having to step into the bank branch anytime from any place. 

I am proud to say that our dedicated staff members all the way from the Senior Management level have been successfully attending to investor inquiries with prompt responses. 

Q: There is a foreign exchange liquidity crunch in the domestic Foreign Exchange (FX) market which has posed difficulties for importers. How DFCC Bank supports the importers in avoiding shortages of essential import items in the market?

We support our clients by offering Import financing facilities to fulfill their short-term financial requirements, settling import related payments where advances will be released in the forms of Import Loans, Custom Duty Loans, Advance Payments Loans and Local Purchase Loans. 

Due to the prevailing economic conditions the Government has imposed certain restrictions on imports and banks have also been requested to prioritise import transactions based on foreign currency inflows and outflows. Once the overall markets conditions improve, we expect these issues to get resolved.