CTT Group appoints banking veteran to launch postal bank
Portugal’s CTT Group has appointed banking sector veteran Luis Pereira Coutinho to launch its planned postal bank. Coutinho was the executive administrator at the country’s largest private bank, Millennium BCP (Banco Comercial Português), responsible for the bank’s operations in several countries.
He also held various other titles within the Millennium BCP group, including member of the supervisory board in the bank’s Polish business, and chairman of the board at its Romanian, Swiss, Greek and US divisions.
Coutinho spent six years living in Poland until 2009 as vice president of the board in the Millennium Bank.
He was deputy CEO at Banco Mello before it was acquired by BCP in 2000, and has also held senior positions at Banco Central Hispano and Credit Lyonnais.
CTT Group, the national postal operator privatised at the end of 2013, said in a statement that Coutinho will lead the team already working “on several fronts” on the constitution of a new Postal Bank.
The company hopes to launch the bank by the end of this year.
CTT was approved to run a postal bank by the country’s central bank, Banco de Portugal, last year, and currently has a licence to do so running up to 27 November.
Local media have said CTT has registered 11 possible names for its postal bank project, including CTT Bank, Banco do Correios and Banco CTT.
