Standard Chartered Looks to Fee Income
LONDON -- Standard Chartered PLC's chairman, Rodney Galpin, said the bank's drive for future profitability would be powered by higher fee income.
"We would like to get our costs ratio down to 60% [of revenues] in the near future, and the real answer is to develop new products and services, not least of all in the fee-earning area," Mr. Galpin said in an interview.
He cited the bank's Hong Kong-based Chartered Financial Holdings as a prime generator of fee income and said it could be making profits of up to $170 million in three to five years.
Standard Chartered's costs ratio, a key indicator of profitability, stood at 67.7% when the bank reported its half-year results earlier this month.
