[SINGAPORE] OCBC has announced that its chief executive Helen Wong, 64, will retire on Dec 31, 2025.
Its head of global wholesale banking, Tan Teck Long, 55, will take over the role on Jan 1, 2026. He brings with him a deep knowledge of the China market, an important prong of the bank’s China-Asean strategy.
As part of a smooth transition over the next 6 months, Tan – who joined OCBC in 2022 – will take on an additional role of deputy CEO at South-east Asia’s second largest bank.
In a statement on Friday (Jul 11), OCBC board chairman Andrew Lee said: “After a rigorous global search, the board unanimously agreed that Teck Long was the best candidate to take the helm.”
A veteran banker from DBS
Tan joined OCBC in 2022 from DBS, where he had been for close to 30 years.
At South-east Asia’s largest bank, he last held the role of chief risk officer.
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Prior to that, he was head of DBS’ corporate bank and chief operating officer of the institutional bank from January 2016 to June 2018.
He was also head of DBS’s institutional banking group in China from September 2011 to January 2016.
His other senior roles at DBS included the group head of special assets management and group head of corporate real estate strategy and administration.
OCBC previously said it hired Tan as part of its regular review of its senior management bench-strength to ensure that its top executives remain relevant to the bank’s strategic objectives.
Tan had been identified through a search conducted by an independent external executive search firm. He was also assessed by OCBC’s board of directors and was found to have the “requisite knowledge and experience for the position”.
Roles at OCBC
Tan’s role as head of global wholesale banking at OCBC is responsible for all banking relationships with its wholesale customers – small-and medium enterprises, large corporates and financial institutions.
He also oversees two product groups – cash management and trade under the transaction banking business; as well as the investment banking business.
The wholesale banking business made up around 38 per cent of the lender’s overall profit before tax in 2024.
Profit before income tax for the segment was down 10 per cent to S$3.5 billion in 2024 from a decline in net interest income and higher expenses and allowances, which more than offset an increase in fee income.
Tan has also been chairing the OCBC Strategic Resilience Group (SRG) since May. This group aims to calibrate OCBC’s position amid continued global shifts, strengthen the bank’s resilience, and improve its long-term business sustainability by seeking new growth engines.
In China, he serves as a director on the boards of OCBC-affiliated Bank of Ningbo and Maxwealth Fund Management Company.
Greater China-Asean flows
OCBC in 2022 launched a corporate strategy to capitalise on the increasing trade and investment flows between the Greater China region and Asean.
For Tan, his goal was to increase revenue from Greater China corporates operating in Asean by more than 50 per cent by 2025.
He also aimed to gain more than 26,000 new small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) customers in Hong Kong over three years.
OCBC will also grow its transactional banking capabilities in Greater China to achieve more than 500 regional mandates for cash management over the next five years, and double its investment banking revenue in three years.
By 2025, the division saw strong revenue growth of 35 per cent, and customer growth of more than 50 per cent from “surging” Greater China-Asean flows.
According to OCBC’s annual report, in 2024, the bank saw nearly 30 per cent on-year rise in new-to-bank customers that were Chinese companies entering the Asean market.
