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Postal Services of Portugal to open CTT bank

Xinhua, November 19, 2015 Adjust font size:

The Postal Services of Portugal (CTT) announced here Wednesday it planned to open a new bank by the end of this month and set up its branches in over 50 post offices across Portugal by March 2016.

The new bank, called Banco CTT and led by Chief Executive Luis Pereira Coutinho, will open its first branch on Nov. 27 to serve group clients only. Additional branches to be opened later will render services to individual customers.

Francisco de Lacerda, president of the CTT, said the achievement marked a "very old ambition of CTT."

Coutinho said CTT currently has 3.7 million customers of financial products, and that "the ambition will be significant," stressing the importance of the bank to "cross sell" its products to its customers.

Coutinho stressed the importance of creating a universal bank for all Portuguese people, young and old, saying "the bank is universal, for grandparents and grandchildren."

The CTT plans to distribute Banco CTT in specific geographical locations frequented by many people, such as shopping centers and city centers.

Banco CTT "will be fairly homogeneous, but obviously we will choose the main shops," said Coutinho.

Founded in 1520, the CTT was privatized on Sept. 10, 2014 for 909 million euros (974 million U.S. dollars).

Portugal was under pressure to privatize its postal services under the the 78-billion-euro bailout program the government signed in 2011 with a troika of international lenders -- the European Commission, International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank. Endi