KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 28 — CIMB Group Holdings Bhd’s digital businesses continued to register healthy growth in the financial year ended December 31, 2021 (FY2021), with Touch ‘n Go Digital increasing its registered users by 10.5 per cent year-on-year to 16.8 million.

Group chief executive officer Datuk Abdul Rahman Ahmad said GO+, the investment offering available in Touch ‘n Go eWallet, had also exceeded two million investors, with total assets under management growing by 261.8 per cent in the fourth quarter (Q4 FY2021) to RM492 million as at December 2021.

Elsewhere in the region, CIMB Philippines grew its customer base by 64.5 per cent to 5.1 million customers and its deposit book by 75.2 per cent to RM1.29 billion.

"This makes CIMB Philippines not only a leading digital bank in the Philippines, but also one of the fastest growing digital banks in ASEAN,” he told a virtual media briefing on the group’s FY2021 performance today.

Abdul Rahman said CIMB Group had seen strong underlying operational performance recovery across all its business segments and geographies, driven by solid growth in operating income, discipline in containing cost escalation and lower provisions as per target.

"We also made considerable progress on our Forward23+ strategic plan where we were able to meet or exceed all our FY2021 profitability targets across core return on average equity, cost-to-income ratio and credit cost/provisions.

"While loan growth came in slightly below target as we reshaped our portfolio towards our focused investment areas and protect asset quality to improve risk-adjusted returns, we saw positive asset growth momentum in Q4 FY2021. This momentum, along with the more positive economic outlook in 2022, provides confidence in our continued growth trajectory,” he said.

On the sustainability front, Abdul Rahman said the group had in 2021 achieved the 79th per centile ranking within the global banking industry in the S&P Global Corporate Sustainability Assessment (CSA), achieving its Forward23+ plan’s target of the top quartile by 2024 three years ahead of target.

The S&P Global CSA is used to assess companies for inclusion into the Dow Jones Sustainability Index. — Bernama