Celebrating Success: RBI Named Best Custodian in CEE

We are thrilled to share some exciting news: Raiffeisen Bank International has been honored as the Best Custodian in Central and Eastern Europe at this year's Global Custodian Awards! This recognition is a testament to the dedication of our incredible Group Prime Services team and the trust and support of our valued clients.

The award highlights our unique Direct-Access operating model in the CEE region, setting us apart in the industry. Our success is rooted in the deep market expertise of our team and the innovative solutions we offer, ensuring we consistently deliver outstanding service.

Receiving this award, grounded in genuine client feedback, underscores the strength of our client relationships and the effectiveness of our end-to-end value chain approach. It demonstrates that our clients truly value our exceptional service and our digital web tool, Global Investor Gate, as their unified solution for securities account-related functionalities.

Since adopting our integrated approach across Business, IT, and Operations, we've witnessed remarkable improvements, including streamlined processes, reduced operational risks, and enhanced profitability - all while maintaining our commitment to delivering exceptional service.

As we celebrate this achievement, we are energized and excited for the future, committed to providing the highest level of service and innovative solutions as we move forward. Together, we will continue to drive excellence and foster growth in the Central and Eastern European regions.

Your Group Prime Services Team

To gain deeper insights into the factors and strategies that led to this outstanding recognition, we spoke with Christian Geberth, Head of Group Prime Services.

What do you believe were the key factors that contributed to RBI being named Best Custodian in CEE at the Global Custodian Awards?

Christian Geberth: I believe several key factors played a significant role in this recognition. First and foremost, our market expertise has allowed us to provide consistent support to our clients across the entire CEE region – even during the most challenging times. The combination of the efficiency offered by our Direct Access model – with its direct connectivity to the market infrastructure in our home markets, coupled with the personalized support from our local experts, creates an unbeatable service experience. This dual approach has truly set us apart in the post-trade industry.

How has the Direct-Access operating model impacted your team's ability to serve clients effectively in the CEE region?

The Direct-Access operating model has significantly enhanced our service offerings to clients investing in Austria and the CEE region. It allows us to take out the complexity of a fragmented region like CEE by centralizing activities for multiple markets. With this we – and our clients - achieve greater operational efficiency by streamlining processes and reducing turnaround times. We are committed to further enhance this set-up by continuous automation and improvements within our Global Investor Gate (GIG). With this we offer a comprehensive, one-stop-shop experience for our clients worldwide.

Can you elaborate on how the integrated approach across Business, IT, and Operations has fostered better collaboration within your teams?

Our integrated approach in an e2e set up also called ‘triangle’ is characterized by a strong collaboration between Business, Operations and IT which proves to be a successful operating model for process and IT heavy products. This starts by jointly designing a vision and respective strategic pillars, setting organizational structures in tribes, and executing it via intense communication and joint efforts between the 3 parties involved. We jointly work on client requests and sales pitches, optimize our processes, and modernize our technology stack. Our ultimate goal is providing excellent products and services across the e2e value chain thus enhancing our client experience.

Looking ahead, what strategies do you plan to implement to maintain and enhance the level of service that earned you this prestigious recognition?

On the product side we further develop our Broker to Custody product suite to act as the main infrastructure provider for securities services. We use automation techniques to optimize our efficiency, here we also started to experiment with AI in our tribe set up. Technology wise we are working on modern IT platforms covering both the front end as well as the back-end systems to enhance the effectiveness of our technology landscape.  

Do we as RBI follow any trends in custody business that you’d like to mention – or are we even trendsetters given the recognition and our service model?

I am proud to say that we are trendsetters in our e2e set up. We are frequently asked by our partners and clients on how we implemented this set up in a short period of time. Together with our direct access model and our groupwide product coverage we offer a USP for clients being interested in CEE but also for our local CEE clients as gateway to the western markets. By offering our products and services groupwide in close collaboration with our colleagues from the network banks we are an attractive partner in this product sphere.