HSBC Philippines gets local CEO

British global banking giant HSBC has appointed its first Filipino CEO for its operations in the Philippines.

Jose Arnulfo ‘Wick’ Veloso, who has given up playing golf as it was costly, made history after serving HSBC for 19 years and 137 years after the bank set up offshore operations in this South-East Asian archipaelago.

The 47-year-old Veloso assumed his CEO post last December. He has 27 years’ experience in capital market.

“Having a Filipino CEO simply underlines HSBC’s commitment to the Philippines,” he was quoted by the ‘Philippine Daily Inquirer’ as saying on Sunday.

Veloso accomplished what could be described as “mission impossible” before his appointment last December by selling 80 billion pesos’ worth (Dh7.15 billion) of San Miguel Corp (SMC) preferred shares in a single tranche.

This was the single largest capital-market deal seen by the local market, marking a new era in the Manila-based SMC, one of South-East Asia’s most diversified conglomerates. SMC used the money to buy out the government’s stake in the conglomerate.

Veloso said it was nice to become a CEO at a time when the Philippines is being looked up to as one of the world’s best investment areas, but it’s also a challenging period for HSBC, owing to the penalties imposed on it by the US government for money laundering in Mexico and Iran.

Veloso said his biggest challenge is to ensure that HSBC Philippines become a major contributor to the country’s economic growth, despite extreme regulatory requirements and stiff competition in the banking industry.

“Because of our international connectivity, we’re strong in foreign exchange, interest rates and all hedging advisory,” stressed. “We’re also strong in debt capital market, custody and clearing. I would like to be able to significantly contribute in bringing our clients to where the opportunities are.”

He is now responsible for 1,254 employees, plus over 5,000 in the business process outsourcing in Metro-Manila suburbs of Quezon City and Alabang.

Veloso became head of the HSBC Philippines’ treasury and global markets business in 2004, when he came back from the group’s Asian headquarters in Hong Kong, where he was head of the Asian local currency debt trading and head of credit derivatives for Asia Pacific. Before that he was head of interest rate trading in HSBC Philippines.

This may surprise many in the business sector, but Veloso is not a typical banker when it comes to spending his time outside of the office. He doesn’t hang out in the golf course for networking and/or dealmaking, although he was an avid golfer way back in college.

He said, “The moment I graduated, my father told me to start paying for my own golf fees and everything related to it—driving range, food, etc—and I realised it’s a very expensive game, so I stopped playing.”
 

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