1Q 2026 Financial Results Media Briefing

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the first results media briefing of this financial year. Today we have with us our deputy chairman and group CEO, Mr. Wee Chong, and our group CFO, Mr. Leong Yong-chi. As usual, Mr. Wee will begin by giving a broad overview of how our franchise has performed and the operating landscape that we are all in. Mr. Leong will then go into more details on the financials and business performance from this quarter. After both presentations, we'll be taking questions from the media. I would now like to invite the CEO to get us started. Mr. Wee, please. Good morning. Thank you for joining us today. I'd like to see all the usual faces. As all of you know, I don't have to say we are operating in a period of item global uncertainty.

Energy prices are volatile. Supply chains remain under pressure. The inflation risks have resurfaced. These are real challenges and we are watching development closely. In time like this, customer looks for stability. At UB, we continue to work alongside our customers as they manage higher costs and volatility. And as they seize opportunities across the region, that is our priority to be right by our customers. So we enter

this period of uncertainty from a position of strength. Our balance sheet remains strong. Our capital and liquidity positions are robust. And our reserve buffers give us the capacity to support customers as they navigate an uncertain. As you know, our CET1 ratio first quarter is 15.3%. MPA coverage 100%, GP performance versus performance loans is 1%. And this is consistent with how we have operated over 90 days. And how we will continue. Now moving to our results. UB delivered a resilient performance in the first quarter.

Net profit was 1.4 billion, moderating 4% year on year, and up 2% quarter on quarter, driven by our core franchise. Compared with the fourth quarter, net interest margin held up at 1.82%. Wealth and loan related fees normalized for both quarter seasonal level. Trading and investment income we founded. Expenses were well controlled. Asset quality was resilient with NPL ratio stable at 1.5%. And total credit costs within expectations. Our balance sheets remain strong with high CET1 ratio of 15.3%.

And robust liquidity ratio. This outcome reflect the quality of our earnings, underpinned by our diversified business model and our regional franchise. Now let me go through the business aspect of the balance. In retail banking, we saw steady growth in Casa, up 10% year on year. On well, up 6% year on year. And cut buildings up 7%. In well, we are making progress supported by growth in AUM and higher conversion of customer asset into investment. In wholesale banking, momentum was positive with healthy loan growth. We continue to expand our

our WA-like revenue stream through regional connectivity flow. With double digit growth in Casa and trade loans. Our trade loans first quarter of this year up 19% year on year. Casa up 10% year on year. Global markets deliver record high income in a more volatile environment. We have never been more confident. Our foundation are in place across ASEAN and we are now focused on undersing this potential. As a long term operator, what drives us is achieving steady, sustainable returns over the long haul. We are executing according to our plans and not chasing

quick short term result, especially given the volatile market we are in. Now let me further elaborate. Today we serve 8.5 million customers across our ASEAN footprint and continue to grow organically. This skill gives us a stronger base to deepen relationships, build ecosystem partnerships and deliver tangible value to customers. Over the past three years, our focus has been on integrating the city portfolio and bringing everything into a single unified platform. That work is largely completed. It position us as one of the most connected banking franchises

in ASEAN with strong capabilities across retail, SMB and wholesale banking. We are moving into the next phase now, unlocking the value of our enlarged customer base to reshape the group towards a more diversified, feed driven mix, anchor on connectivity, trade and cash, lifestyle solutions like credit cards and wealth. In retail we see significant opportunities including in wealth underpinned by large and increasingly affluent customer base that is under penetrated. This gives us a long runway for sustainable organic growth. Our immediate focus is to grow AUM and improve invested AUM penetration.

Execution over the next few quarters will be focused on this key initiative. One bank approach, helping out strength in retail, SMB and wholesale, strengthening advisory with more personalized solutions, continuing to invest in talent including in private banking and advancing digital and cross-border wealth capabilities particularly within ASEAN and with North Asia. Over time, our ambition is clear to double wealth income by 2030 should discipline organic execution

platforms, people and solutions. Beyond retail, a strong regional franchise allow us to play a meaningful role in supporting foreign direct investment and cross-border growth. One is Johor Singapore Special Economic Zone. Through our Green Lane arrangement with Invest, Johor, we have helped facilitate more than $6.8 billion in FDI into the zone. This reflects our role as a regional connector across ASEAN and our commitment to supporting long-term growth. Our integrated platforms for payment, trade and cash and deep sector expertise

are power, trade and transaction banking growth. We are deepening coverage in high-growth sectors such as technology, sustainable energy, EVs, consumer goods and infrastructure. We are also penetrating our customer supply chain ecosystems to support the original growth. Across retail and wholesale, we are reshaping the group towards capitalized higher ROE growth supported by a more disciplined approach to balance sheet management. We are confident of achieving sustainable growth with stability in the coming years. Let me close with a few thoughts on the road. Microenvironment is uncertain and we stay vigilant. EOB has weathered many cycles before

to continue to work closely with our customers, partners and stakeholders to capture opportunities for long-term growth and manage risks. We are also investing in our people, building AI-ready skills and embedding AI across the bank to work smarter and more efficiently. As you know, we certainly move our tech and innovation teams to the Bongo digital district as you can see from three times today in the heart of Singapore innovation ecosystem. Now to guide you for this year, we expect low single digit long growth, two-year name of 1.75 to 1.8 percent, high single

digit fee growth, low single digit operating costs growth, total credit cost of 25 to 30 basis points. To good times and difficult ones, we will continue to be the steady end of our customer and call on. Thank you. And now I invite Dong Ji to share more in terms of financial feedback. Thank you Yichong and good morning everyone. Before I go through the financial results, let me start with a few key messages that you should take a look at. Our first quarter performance reflected the resilience of our diversified franchise. It has been a steady performance that we delivered. I'll go through the financial details of each of those items in a short

while, but I wanted to highlight that in terms of the execution of our strategic priorities, all of our businesses, whether it's retail wholesale and markets, have continued to show an evidence steady growth. In retail, both the CASA and wealth products as well as credit cards demonstrated steady growth, while in wholesale we saw double digit growth momentum in trade as well as CASA. Likewise for global markets. The third message to leave with you is a stable risk profile with a limited Middle East exposure that has been stress tested. Our capital and provision buffers continue to remain resilient and will help us navigate the uncertainties in the market.

And lastly, in terms of momentum in the business, we continue to see healthy client engagement and pipeline activity, even with the market volatilities that we are seeing. In terms of the financial highlights, in the first quarter of 2026, we delivered an operating profit of 1.9 billion dollars and a net profit of 1.4 billion dollars. This was 2% up quarter on quarter and 4% down year on year. Net interest margin moderated two basis points to 1.82. We have a page discussing this in more detail later, which I'll go through. The move in terms of the net interest margin is

consistent with the prevailing rate environment, but it was also offset by proactive management of our funding cost. In terms of net fee income, we maintain positive trajectory, rising 2% from last quarter. This was driven primarily by strong loan related fees as well as steady wealth management activity. Trading and investment income increased 88%, quarter on quarter to 405 million dollars. This follows a seasonal year-end lull in the fourth quarter of last year. This is alongside more favorable trading and liquidity management performance. asset quality remains stable at 1.5%, NPL ratio at 1.5%, while our NPA coverage

remains at a healthy 100% and including the collateral taken into account, that's 272%. Again, I have a page that goes into that in more detail. Our capital and funding positions remain strong, the ET ratio at 15.3 with NSFR at 115%. Next, I'll just draw your attention to two lines in terms of operating profit. If you look at the middle of the page there, quarter on quarter, we drew 8% and at the net profit line, quarter on quarter, we grew 2%. Next, I'll focus on the group retail performance. In terms of the overall performance, our retail franchise

remains consistent and disciplined, focusing on priorities and delivery across the businesses. Although the challenging rate environment led to a moderation of profit at the profit before tax level to 537 million dollars, it was a continued benefit from resilient contributions from our wealth management and cards business. In terms of wealth, invested AUM and wealth income rose 9% and 6% respectively. Card buildings also grew a healthy 7% year on year. Likewise, for our retail CASA balances, it grew 10% year on year with the

CASA mix to deposits improving to 58%. This reinforces the strength and stability of our group's deposit franchise. Next, I'll cover wholesale banking. Likewise, consistent execution of our strategies have led to a consistent delivery of results. If you look at our transaction banking line, it continues to remain about half of the wholesale banking income supported primarily by double-digit growth in CASA balances as well as trade loans. I think you saw in CEO's presentation earlier, CASA balances grew 10% while our trade loans grew 19%. From a customer

treasury income for wholesale customers, it grew 11%. Investment banking continued to show good momentum. Year on year, you see some moderation because first quarter of last year, we had mentioned that there was an extraordinary slew of items, one-off transactions during that quarter. Overall, loans grew 4% year on year, continued to be led by solid demand in the technology sector in particular. Next, in global markets, client demand for hedging and investment solutions rebounded following the year-end seasonal slowdown, lifting our customer treasury income to $294 million.

Also, from the non-customer treasury income, a favorable cost of funds environment helped us to capture liquidity deployment and trading opportunities amid the heightened market volatility. Next, I'll talk about net interest income and margins. Net interest income did moderate due to the shorter quarter by 1%. If this was the adjusted, the net interest income would have increased by 1%. Overall, our net interest income remained resilient at $2.3 billion, underpinned by disciplined funding cost management, balance sheet optimization, as well as modest asset growth. I'll discuss the NIM in more detail on this page.

So, if you recall, our fourth quarter NIM was at $1.84, and we walked through from left to right. Despite the lower SOAR environment in a quarter, our SING dollar book delivered at three basis points uplift. The high bore, however, reduced NIM by two basis points, reflecting some of the rate dynamics in Hong Kong dollar book. We did undertake proactive funding cost management, both across retail deposits in the form of our one account. We also did the same for our wholesale banking deposits and led together offset the asset pricing measures. Just one more point on the NIMs. The exit NIM for that quarter was $1.83. So, we ended the

quarter at $1.83. Gross fee income grew by 1% to $857 million. This continues to be underpinned by momentum and wealth, as well as loan related fees. Card fees dipped in March, but we expect that to normalize in terms of spending for the rest of the year. Next, expenses, stable expenses, strong management discipline in terms of managing our IT, non-IT, and other expenses. Our overall expenses stood at $1.5 billion. But this is balanced with continued investment in three areas, strategic initiatives that we are deploying across the bank, technology to support

franchise expansion and meet regulatory requirements. And third, the next couple of pages I'll discuss our asset quality in more detail. Non-performing ratio stood at 1.5% unchanged. If you look at our NPA formation, it's $341 million. The following page discusses some of the credit costs. From 19 basis points total credit cost last quarter, this quarter's total credit cost is at 26 basis points in line with our guidance 25 to 30 basis points. The general allowance write back in the quarter

reflected certain migration accounts to NPL with a lower write back versus last quarter, underscoring our continued conservative provisioning stance. Next, in terms of our coverage ratios, we maintain our GP coverage ratio at 1%, NPA coverage at 100%, and the unsecured NPA coverage improved to 272%, as I mentioned earlier on. Ross loans grew 4% year on year. This was driven by broad base expansion across our businesses in wholesale, term funding, trade lending, and also retail mortgages. The quality focused lending is amidst very strong market

competition, even amidst prevailing market conditions. Let's talk about funding. Next. Our liquidity and funding positions remain solid with LCR at 144% and NSFR at 115%. Both comfortably above the minimum regulatory requirements. CASA deposit balances continue to remain strong, underpinning our stable funding profile. In terms of capital, our CET ratio for the quarter, CET ratio of 15.3%, fully loaded 15.2%. With this strong capital base

and resilient liquidity position, we are well positioned to support customers through this period of uncertainty. Our return of excess capital to shareholders remain on track. Our 2 billion share buyback program has said March 2026. We have done $706 million, equivalent to roughly 35% of the plan. It is on track. In summary, let me just repeat some of the key messages for you. Our performance reflects the resilience of our franchise. We continue to execute consistently across key segments. Direct exposure to the Middle East

remains limited. We do expect uncertainties to prevail, but our capital base is strong and provision buffers are adequate to help us manage through that. Looking ahead, in terms of guidance, loan growth to be in the low single-digit range for this year, net interest margin to be within 1.75 to 1.8, continued execution in wealth, cards, and trade will support fee-income growth towards high single-digit levels and remain disciplined on costs. But we expect some low single-digit growth in terms of our operating costs as we continue to invest in technology and people as well as our strategic priorities. With that, I conclude my presentation and we will

open up to questions and answers. Thank you, Yung-chi. We will now begin the Q&A segment. Darling in on teams, please use the recent function if you have a question. We'll take the first question from the lead. Hi, congrats on the numbers, Sophie. I have three questions. The first one, could you talk a little bit more, I think, at the beginning you mentioned UOB is looking to double wealth income by 2030. What kind of number we will see by then? I'm not sure which place you are looking at. Second question, many analysts pointed out to NPA formation in greater China, which expanded 15%

on quarter. Which sector is that? Is it still CRE? And could you share with us Hong Kong or mainland? The third question is that whether UOB is looking to seek access to mythos, the anthropic AI model. What are you doing about that? Thank you. I anticipated all this wealth. But I think over the last few years our focus has been on integrating the city consumer, even though we took over Citibank for the last four years ago. But the whole integration effort is very critical for me. And everything is over now. As you listen from my speech, I think

we will position us to be one of the most connected. Because we took over, we have the most comprehensive asset of the place. That takes a lot of time and effort to connect. Now, without all this infrastructure, it's going to be very difficult. And also, I don't want to take in the customer if I cannot deliver. So I think all these are way ahead of what we anticipated. I think for this year, the next few quarters, we'll start to see the wealth business. Because we are focusing on helping our wealth, as you say. We will continue to double our wealth

management. Our infrastructure is ready. And we are also focusing on one bank approach, because the wholesale and retail, we all work together to generate. And also, we are strong in foreign direct investment. These are all the foreign people coming in to operate in this region. And as an organization, as a bank, the effort is collective effort that we are trying to work on. So to answer you, yes, the next few quarters, the next one, two years, we will start to see the doubling of income. Any number that we can see, we may see at the end of 2030.

The number will be great. I cannot tell you the number, but I think definitely it's a big potential looking at our customer base that we have. And this is the whole bank, not just private bank. No, the whole bank. So the private bank will be, again, it's a whole collective bank. It will come. We could supplement a few of that. China, if you're looking for a reference point, 2025 is when we communicated. So we used a 2025 reference point. That's all right. All right. For doubling of wealth to 2030. Now, you had another question on the Greater China NPA formation that is specific to real estate.

But if you look from NPL ratio, it is a heightened NPL ratio with low NPA coverage, but unsecured coverage continues to remain high. Right. And I think you had a question on anthropic and its announcement, I think, was on 7th of April regarding my thoughts. I think this is something we are all taking very seriously. But although to date, the many of our vendors and key partners in the technology space are still assessing and reviewing actions to be taken. In the meantime, from our own perspective, a lot of things are being done in terms of strengthening our surveillance, hardening our infrastructure,

making sure we are working jointly with the agencies in Singapore, and also in the industry peer group as well. Everybody is keeping each other abreast in terms of developments on how to navigate as that evolves. It will not be the first and probably not be the last of such attacks, not attacks, sorry, such capabilities that could lead to attacks. But will you have access to? I think this is exactly what I like to think. This is not the current infrastructure. But we are wondering in customer, that if you say you look at tech lines right by me, very important, rather than I just take a short term profit, it's easy.

But you look at even our deposit growth, it's quite muted. Why? Because market is uncertain. If I take the money in, where do I have to place up? If the long go, it's not as good. Unless I want to enlarge my balance sheets. Is that the right time to do this? So I think T&L is one thing, balance sheet is one thing. The world is still very uncertain. And even across our sector, you look at Thailand, the oil crisis, maybe Malaysia, Indonesia is good, but for us, it's a portfolio that we are looking at. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, Renu. Morning, Renu from the Business Dance. Congratulations on the results. Two broad questions. First,

on wealth talent. You mentioned you'll be boosting hiring. Is it mostly in the ASEM small market? So can we expect some hiring in Singapore as well? And there's quite a lot of competition for the wealth talent among other banks. How are you going to navigate that? Second broad question is on the house view on US Fed and the reactivation. Has that changed from three months ago? And what's your own interest in responsibility today? Thank you. You know, the wealth space is something that, yes, competition is there. Everyone is competing. But if you want to join an organization, you have to see the customer base. Because you as an individual, your connection is similar. You want to join an organization that can help to support you over and above your own connection. You look at us. We have the

ASEAN-appropriate. We also have the North Asian that we want to double down. So we have two engines that we are running. Last, as I emphasize, is a one-bank approach. My wholesale, I cannot share with you the statistics, but I have the statistics, the wholesale bank that's supporting a lot of our weakness. So what we're doing now is to make sure the infrastructure is ready. From the user brand new standpoint, also to protect the customer. That to me is important. Then if we are ready, and in fact we are ready, the next few quarter you will start to see coming.

I don't want to have a short term and then customers are not happy that they live to somebody else. Because strategically I think Singapore, you've got to look at it in the medium to long term with the Middle East crisis, Singapore increasingly will be different. We are one of the local bank. So I don't see our wealth figure is so much different. Even our setup, even our ASEAN-appropriate. Better in mind. On the interest rate question, maybe I can take that. Our house view on US rates is that we expect there's still one more rate cut this year. But the translation between US rates to SORA, I think has significantly decoupled compared to history.

We are obviously a lot more sensitive to SORA as opposed to US rates. As far as SORA is concerned, we expect limited more downside on SORA. I think it has already moved significantly over the course of last year. If you look at NIMS from our last two quarters, in fact, it's been bouncing around and looking quite stabilized. So even if there is downside, it is fairly limited. But I point you again to our NIMS guidance for the full year. We think it's 1.75 to 1.8. Hi, Ray from Reuters. Thanks for the presentation and congrats on your results.

I have a follow up on the wealth angle. So in terms of flows, where are you seeing the greatest opportunities from flows? I would say ASEAN is one of them, South Asia, even though we are not so strong, but increasingly, we are also paying a lot of attention from greater China. The middle is not so obvious at this point in time. We need to long term, it may shrink some of the activity back to ASEAN, but it's yet to be seen. But I think our immediate is the customer base that we have. Not so much, yes, new customer

income. We will engage relationship manager, they will target new customer, but my existing customer base of eight over million. This is where the low hanging fruit is. This is why we are very, very confident. The next few quarters, I cannot tell you the number. We will definitely increase the AUM. We also improve the investment. Because the investment AUM is the customer base that you have. We are conservative, we want to protect our customers. You don't just accept the tech money, you express your customer. Because today the environment is well answered. Rather they be safe. We can earn less fee, but I want them to be safe.

But opportunity comes, this is where the protection is. Thank you. Another question on the wall itself. I know you have limited exposure in the Middle East, but then the higher oil prices are hitting pretty hard the ASEAN economy. Where do you see the impact from that, especially given your focus on the Middle East? I think the first order impact I think for the Middle East, I think our exposure is quite insignificant. Second order impact is the debt-maker effect for SME. So far we are going through a stress analysis. It's too early to tell at this point in time, because everything is so fluid. The worst is it is prolonged. Then you may get a stack phase kind of inflation and no good.

This is where I keep emphasizing balance in this. You will be capital strong. We want to make sure we are willing to serve the customer. P&L, yes, is important. All of you are looking at P&L. I was looking at P&L, but at the end of the day, we have to have a balance. I had to be strong first than P&L. If I'm weak, I just continue to drive P&L. My capital is not strong. Then I'm chasing after too many things. At this point, market is uncertain. We want to make sure our staff is well trained to combat the AI. You can see the government is also paying a lot of attention to the people and all these things. We need

to be responsible. We need to be socially responsible. If I could add to that, your question around our wealth, where it comes from, more than roughly 58% of our wealth comes from overseas customers. Your question around Middle East, I think as you mentioned, our first order, meaning companies with direct geographical exposure in Middle East has less than 2% of our donor exposures. The focus now is on the second order, third order. The second order is more looking at energy vulnerable industries. So sectors such as transportation, basic materials, utilities, agriculture, etc. We're looking and assessing how much of these

industries and compliance while these industries may be affected as a result. Third order is a little bit harder because it's a lot of assumptions around how prolonged this will be. There is potential impact on overall Asia's economic growth environment, inflationary pressures and so on. So that actually requires much for stress scenarios. Mr. Wei, I took your point on strong balance sheet and you are making sure that your staff is well taken care of. I mean, I have seen some fighting this morning about disposal of minor assets and there's an ongoing rationalization. Can I take it that you meant there won't be any

job cuts at UB? Maybe I can clarify that there was a problem today because we set up a company. Yeah. It's actually part of our BAU activity because under our venture management business, we do occasionally set up a GP for managing funds for investors. So that was actually something that's being set up specifically for a digital fund that we're managing for a family office. A client. Of course. You know with AI, it's not a job. And we take it up to a partner. As a responsible employer, we want to train now,

spend money to train, make sure that they are able to navigate with one. That is how we want to do it. Ultimately, I mean, it's up to our employees. Give them the confidence, give them the secure environment. We also provide them the job on the job exposure. That is important. No point to train, keep your hand. At the end of the day, you train them, you have to put them on the job to experiment. This is what we are trying to do. AI for us is not artificial intelligence. It's actually augmented intelligence. The priority is to roll out tools that augments our staff's capabilities, how to improve productivity, efficiency, customer service,

risk management, etc. So a lot of the things we're doing is actually supporting our people. As a number or statistic to you, about 30,000 of our staff today have co-pilot at their fingertips. So we are actively promoting the use of these tools and training and rescaling our staff. You know, our process is used by heavy. So streamline a lot of processes that cut across, think about it better, but cut across the whole week. So I also want our staff to be happy, work-life balance, giving them the tools to make sure that they work hard, but for a long hour, both of them are not difficult. That is our job.

Go on Disney cruise. So you see the emphasis with Pongo Digital District, us moving to the 2000 staff. They're all very focused in terms of our tech, digital, we've also started an innovation academy dedicated to training our staff. You've seen that we've launched an innovation hub at NTU, in news articles in prior months. I think it's all part of a continuum of activities that we undertake. It's a journey, right? It's not just a one-time exercise. This is here to stay. Hula. Three questions. One is sort of the, what do you see in this, in the opportunity around

RWA that wholesale banking, is it mainly wealth or is it something? And also, transaction banking stuff. But you're doing that a lot of it anyway, but you intend to accelerate more of that. You can see our deposit growth is not at high. You want to have more deposits. Okay, so the question on deposit. So your peer, and they have to bring their needs to BSA, since they've brought a lot of deposits and they are putting them in HQLA while loan growth has sort of moderated to them.

So what's your view on that? Are you doing the same thing? I think there are two parts to the question and I shouldn't be commenting on what else. So there are two parts to it. One is just bear in mind that our deposit growth overall is in line with system. But if you look at the components of what we are doing at TASA level, and maybe this is something you should ask others, our CASA ratio at retail is 58%. CASA ratio at wholesale is 60%. Those are fairly industry. And the reason why focus on CASA is lower cost of deposits, better stickiness in terms of customer franchise, better opportunities to cross sell.

So those are things that we have articulated as strategic intent and we're executing well to that intent. As for HQLA, I think that relates more to low-typical access deposits, and you're not deploying it to hire, return, use as loans and so on. Then do you deploy this to HQLA to maintain your NII versus managing NIM, right? Our perspective on that is you need to strike a fine balance between NIM as well as NII. Of course, you want to make sure you continue to bring in NII deploy access deposits into HQLA as long as they are new positive. But at the same time,

you cannot lose sight of your NIM as well, because that's the overall margin in terms of your books. And it's how your cost of funds and your views, your funding mix, it all comes together. So the other thing also that we had from the previous briefing was that they have de-risked their SME and consumer franchise a bit in places like, what is it, India, which you don't have in Indonesia. So how, I mean, you don't separate out the Indonesian market on your first quarter, but could you give us an idea of how that has been so far? Indonesia is still very small for us. I think maybe it's 3% of our loan.

I would say, wow, it's easy to talk about the end of the day is the origination. You look at customer, you look at employers, you look at the employment track record and things like that. You're still growing, you look at the consumer, you look at the mortgages. This is Indonesia. And in fact, this is a time, especially the SME, you have to stand by them. This is not the target of de-risk. Okay, okay. So who are your customers in Indonesia in terms of the consumer? That's the wind customer. And the SMEs are?

We do have more big corporates, I would say, because we have limited distribution. Retail is mid-high, a fluent customer base. Likewise for the wholesale banking when you're out in countries outside of Singapore, whether it's for any or large customers, I think it's guided by our strategic solutions group. We've identified seven specific industries and were guided by those industries. Singapore, because it's home market, we are more board-based. We provide services across the whole spectrum, customers, but outside of Singapore, it's more targeted because there's information asymmetry when you're operating in somebody else's backyard.

This one, the 231 million ECLC work to site, and have you sort of changed your NED model at all? Or is it because of the Middle East? From the tariff to the Middle East, and you could imagine that there'd be a lot of changes. And then the 341 million of NPA formation Sorry, what was the question on the NPA formation? What sector or what do you offer here? I think if you step back and look at our BAU run rate, usually NPA formation should be normalized around 300 to 400 million. So I think it's in that range. I mean, you can't run a business with

zero NPA formation. I think with respect to the MEV, I think we are starting to take some of the uncertainties around Middle East to account. But also bear in mind that the first two months of this year was pre-Middle East, right? Effectively, tensions fled up February 28. And that continues to be the case, and we will continue to monitor and adjust accordingly. So you should probably expect MEV refresh to be adjusted in the following quarters. The tariff thing has gone at the tariff concerns. Are they over or what? I mean, how do you view this and how do you build it into your second and your stress test?

It has not gone away, but it has morphed. It's not for us to comment, but I think the tariff numbers, I think still factors into consideration when we talk to clients and clients need to take that into account and make their capbacks and investment decisions. It has not gone away, but it's been superseded by logistical issues, fuel costs, lack of access to materials, and potential impact on demand. There are other implications now for them to take into account. In terms of your stress test, does it change? I mean, it has to change a lot within the last

year. I think it is a few times. Yeah, it is all good. It is all good. That's right. I think there is no right and wrong. At the end of the day, it is very difficult for us to predict what is going to happen. It is very unpredictable. We have to make sure that we take care of ourselves first. That is the first round. If we can't even take care of ourselves, how are we going to take care of our customers? That is the very amazing one. We have to be strong. We take care of our customers. That is important. Not every customer will take care of us. Make sure that the customer with the good track record has been with us for

a long time. We will continue to support because they will have to go through a hump. This is not something that is the business failure. This is the external factor. Just to be clear also with what Yongqi mentioned about NPA, you said that within range, in each quarter, 300, 400, that is also applicable to the greater China formation. You said that it is all well covered. It is a whole book. Our GP coverage, I will point back again in Q3 when we raised the provision coverage, it brought our GP coverage to 1%. For the last week, Q3, Q4, and now 1Q, you have seen that our GP coverage remains at 1%. In fact, we were getting questions

this morning from other people. Why don't you raise it more? Given Middle East, I think that blends with what Yichang was mentioning. The situation started end of February. We are monitoring. There is still a lot of uncertainties and the impact is still yet to be fully transmitted throughout the country. I don't think we are saying that there will not be any more. I'm saying that we need to be watchful and adjust accordingly. But specifically, I'm being painful here. I'm sorry about that. But greater China, is there a concern because the spike of 15% on quarter, is it from real estate? Is it Hong Kong

operator China? Do you see that coming down soon? It's greater China. It is real estate. I think that was raised earlier on. I also highlighted that even though our NPL ratio and NPA coverage had moderated slightly because of that, but our unsecured coverage for greater China portfolio continues to be comfortable. Thank you. We have a question from online, Sheila from the Straits Times. Sheila, could you unmute yourself and ask your question, please? We turn then back to the

floor here. Okay. Any other questions from the floor? Yeah. So thank you for your presentation earlier. I have two questions again on wealth and the other on manpower. So the first on wealth, wealth has become increasingly important for all the banks in Hong Kong, including UB. You'll be thinking of pursuing further MAA to grow its market share in wealth in the region and are there opportunities in this area that you're looking at? The second on manpower, you've talked about AI. UB's workforce shrank in 2025 compared with a year ago. What is your outlook on hit count this year, considering what AI can do as you pointed out earlier I saw. You know, well, everybody is focusing on wealth. Rightly, there's opportunity. I believe the price will be very high. At the end of the day, you've got to make sense. You've got to make sense.

Right. What makes sense to me at this point in time, I'm not ruling out in our bank group. On that, mainly we can go. This is our strong point. Other people don't have the customer base. I have the customer base. That is a key, key different case. So the next quarter or so, you will start to see that happen. So the second question is around hit count. Yeah, hit count, I think we are managing it. We will continue to grow certain segments that we need to grow. In terms of wealth, we will continue to increase our hit count on wealth.

Certain segments we can de-emphasize, but certain segments we will over-emphasize. So on balance, I would say it's quite stable. Despite the AI, despite that you see from the newspaper, you are the writer, you say, oh, people return. I think that is the last result. It's a very negative way. You want to train people at the same time you tell them in their days. After you train, you get retrained. It's largely stable. It's natural progression of the hit count and workforce across the year. We continue to invest in areas where there are growth opportunities and higher people. Which areas that you see as less opportunities? I mean, wealth is something that you will emphasize and add, but which areas that Mr. We say will de-emphasize?

De-emphasize. Which area is less granular to grow? Certain jobs, like our call center, we can make use of AI to automate certain processes. I can use it. But what you can see all this, so we can depend less on humans. So make the service more predictable. But let me emphasize again, it's about augmenting our staff. Not replacing. So all the AI initiatives that we are pursuing again, it's about improving productivity, improving efficiency, improving our risk management. These sort of things help our staff. So with the improved

productivity, if you have natural attrition, you don't have to replace at the same replacement rate. So we are managing this over time and not replacing staff with AI. I think the notion that accountability and trust can be replaced by an artificial bot, I think that's not the philosophy that we ascribe to. Understood. Thanks for that clarification. I think I'll just read out the question from Sheila from the Straits Times. Would you share UB's acquisition strategy in the region, particularly in light of reports that we had explored acquiring HSBC's Indonesian assets, which was eventually bought by OCBC? How does this shape UB's inorganic growth plans going forward?

I think CEO mentioned that briefly, we are always on the lookout for opportunities, whether previously or going forward. Now, whether the opportunities make sense, it has to check quite a few boxes, whether it meets our strategy, doesn't meet certain capabilities that we want. Are they filling certain business gaps that we don't have or geographical gaps? And also, ultimately, is the price to pay correct? It's not just a dollar price. And don't forget, there's also integration cost. And going forward, do you think the cost synergies and revenue synergies are going to make sense for you? So the calculation isn't just about the transaction price, but the cost of the entire project itself has to make sense.

You know, you look at our decision of single bank, the less than the integration is not as straightforward as what we set up back. But then the benefit is we have the eight over million based on the other thing. So this is already water under. So we are now trying to monetize this. Okay. But the initial part of it is actually quite stressing because we have to use city bank technology platform while we are building our platform. You know, you cost us arm and leg

to make use of city bank. But it's all over. That is a strategic move that we think is important for us to scale, especially the consumer. Don't underestimate that it was finally there. And now in fact, our customer base is bigger than Singapore. And it's growing. And people are our business partner. They want to deal with us because our customer base, you do it. Disney, you look at Taylor Street. Why are they coming to us? Because of the original people from Thailand, people from Vietnam. That is the power of our identity. Don't underestimate that. So for me to generate wealth in the digital way, in the cost-effective

way is easier than including our, this is what we have to do with infrastructure. Our tomorrow. I can share with you my CIO fund. The growth is 300%. But this is a small number. It's not, I'm dealing with a sovereign wealth fund. Suddenly put in 5 million, 10 billion. No. But this is sustainable. People can trust us. Every month, $100, $200, but accumulate. This is where you want. So you mean that there's been a 300% close in money coming into from your tomorrow. Tomorrow, what they call the CIO fund.

A few billion, no. Two billion. Thank you. I will take that off. You can take it offline. I can give you. By the number. This is all curated. Fun wealth management ideas for our clientele that they can access directly from the tomorrow. I think the statistics will take it offline and provide it to you. I think that's all the time we have. But the cost, you follow your integration. Because your costs were a bit high these last two years. That was because of the integration over and above the one. Yeah, of course. But it cost high because of my revenue. Because when my revenue goes up, if I able to get the customer base, it's already there.

So you see, so the CIO cost and the combination. Yeah. There are a few things. The cost relating to Citi, both the acquisition as well as the integration. All over. The whole platform takes that all done. As for cost looking forward, I think it's a balance that you need to strike because we can always manage the IR by turning off the tabs in terms of investments forward. And I think we are keeping a very balanced approach in terms of continued investment in people. Technology stack and forward looking investments as well what we need to build. So I think cost to income ratio is something we will watch obviously very carefully. And it swings with time as well as income numbers as well.

Okay. So I think we've guided our cost growth this year is likely to be in the low single digits. We need to continue to make investments in our people and platforms. All right. Thank you. That's all the time we have today. Thank you very much. If you have any further questions, do reach out to the team and we'll see you with that. Thank you.