CIMB Group Solidifies Regional Focus and Commitment to ASEAN Customers

CIMB Group, a leading ASEAN bank and one of the region’s foremost corporate advisors, hosted a media engagement event on July 21, 2025, at the CIMB headquarters in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The event was intended to provide an outlook on the ASEAN market and CIMB Group's strategic initiatives and responses to geopolitical tensions.

B2B Cambodia was one of three media platforms invited from Cambodia to attend and gain insight on how CIMB’s Cambodian arm contributes to the banking group’s growth and strategic direction.

With around 33,000 staff, over 28 million customers and 592 retail branches worldwide, CIMB Group is the fifth largest banking group by assets in the ASEAN region. The bank’s biggest markets are in Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand, with 303, 217 and 51 branches opened respectively. Cambodia is also a rising market for the bank, with 14 branches now operating within the country. 

Changing Geopolitical Conditions and ASEAN Growth Strategy

The media engagement event sought to cover a variety of topics concerning ASEAN financial markets today, and how CIMB Group is responding to the changing geopolitical landscape. A major point of discussion naturally surrounded the challenges brought on by U.S. tariffs. When asked how CIMB is recalibrating its strategy across borders in response to new trade uncertainties, Group CEO Novan Amirudin stressed that the bank hasn’t so much ‘recalibrated’ its regional approach, but has rather strengthened its commitment to customer-focused action.  

“This is a time where there's a lot of uncertainty, it's difficult to forecast and difficult to do business, so this is a time where CIMB is doubling down on spending more time with our customers,” he said. 

Some of the main areas CIMB Group is seeking to better support clients and reduce uncertainties in times of heightened volatility, Amirudin shared, are in the improvement of the bank’s digital offerings, and in making it easier for customers to conduct business and make payments across borders. 

Amirudin highlighted CIMB’s strong wholesale treasury and markets team and underlined the bank as one of the top players in the ASEAN region when it comes to the foreign exchange (FX) market. Further stressing the bank’s ASEAN focus, he mentioned that CIMB has introduced an ‘ASEAN passport’ mechanism that allows for the accelerated onboarding of ASEAN customers into the new Johor-Singapore Special Economic Zone (SEZ) that was launched at the beginning of 2025 between Malaysia and Singapore.

Reflecting on ASEAN’s potential and how current geopolitical tensions are leading to an opportunity for significant capital to be captured and shifted from the U.S. to ASEAN markets, Amirudin said:

I think we all know the benefits of ASEAN, its young population, rising middle-class, fastest growing GDP that attracts the largest amount of foreign direct investment (FDI) globally… but I think the one thing that ASEAN hasn't done enough, which we really need to focus on… is telling [more] stories.

He explained that about USD 30 trillion worth of financial assets in U.S. capital markets is held by foreigners, of which somewhere around 20 per cent (USD 6 trillion) is owned by East Asian economies, like China, Korea and Japan. He underlined the importance CIMB Group sees in working with its customers to “tell more stories” about the region’s growth potential to ensure that they are able to seize the opportunity and get a fair share of this capital injected into ASEAN markets.

What Role Does CIMB Cambodia Play in the Banking Group’s Regional Growth? 

Remarking specifically on CIMB’s presence in Cambodia, Amirudin affirmed that the bank caters to all customer segments in the country, including retail, commercial, corporate and even SMEs. He added that CIMB Cambodia “completes [the] ASEAN picture” for the bank, which has also worked to facilitate any cross-border flows for major Malaysian companies established in the country, such as for Smart Axiata.  

In terms of the bank’s future investments in the Kingdom, Amirudin said it is an ongoing journey for CIMB who continues to strive towards increasing its digital presence and offerings in Cambodia. 

“We've introduced a new, upgraded front-facing app for our retail customers in Cambodia recently; I’m tracking the numbers, and it's looking extremely promising in terms of adoption rates,” Amirudin shared.

He added that CIMB will introduce a similar front-end facing app for businesses called ‘OCTO Biz’, which will launch in 2026.