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Shinhan outruns rivals in resuming investor roadshows abroad
Shinhan Financial Group Chairman Cho Yong-byoung, left, poses with Nigel Topping, the U.K.'s high-level champion for climate action, at the 26th U.N. Climate Change Conference (COP26), at Shinhan headquarters in Seoul, Sept. 14. Courtesy of Shinhan Financial Group
By Park Jae-hyuk
By Park Jae-hyuk
Shinhan Financial Group Chairman Cho Yong-byoung will resume his overseas business trips next week, while the leaders of other financial holding companies here remain cautious about going abroad during the COVID-19 pandemic.
This is the first time for him to travel abroad for business, since his attendance at the IMF's annual meeting in Washington, D.C., in October 2019.
The main purpose of his forthcoming trip is to introduce Shinhan's strategies for net-zero emissions to the participants of the 26th U.N. Climate Change Conference (COP26) Finance Day event that will be held Nov. 3 in Glasgow, Scotland, following a two-day meeting of political leaders worldwide.
Nigel Topping, the U.K.'s high-level champion for climate action at COP26, met the Shinhan chairman in Seoul last month and invited him to the Finance Day event, which will be attended by representatives from global financial giants such as Citigroup, HSBC and BlackRock, as well as those from Korea's state-run banks ― the Korea Development Bank (KDB) and the Export-Import Bank of Korea (Eximbank).
Cho will deliver a separate speech at another session of the conference, which will be held Nov. 9 by the Ministry of Environment and the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), a Seoul-headquartered intergovernmental organization dedicated to promoting sustainable economic growth.
On the sidelines of the conference, he will visit New York, London and Paris to meet investors and representatives from foreign companies serving that are Shinhan's major shareholders.
“Because we will announce our third-quarter earnings on Oct. 26, we decided to take advantage of our chairman's forthcoming trip to hold investor roadshows abroad,” said a Shinhan executive who will accompany the chairman on his trip. “At this moment, we are arranging meetings with foreign investors.”
In contrast, KB Financial Group said its chairman has yet to make any plans for traveling overseas. Hana Financial Group declined to comment on its chairman's schedule.
Woori Financial Group was once said to be pushing ahead with resuming investor roadshows this year in North America, the U.K. and Singapore, but its spokesman denied this rumor, saying it is still unclear whether its chairman can head overseas for business within this year.
“We may consider resuming our investor roadshows abroad, if the situations improve in other countries,” the Woori spokesman said. “Instead of holding face-to-face meetings with foreign investors, we are aggressively holding contactless investor roadshows at this moment.”
Before the pandemic, the chief executives of the nation's top four financial groups visited other countries frequently to direct investor roadshows abroad.
In 2019, the Shinhan chairman visited the U.S., Canada, the U.K. and Nordic nations to meet representatives from global asset management firms. KB Chairman Yoon Jong-kyoo also visited investors in Hong Kong and Australia in April that year. Woori Chairman Son Tae-seung traveled to the Middle East, Europe and North America in October that year to direct the group's overseas investor roadshows.