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Credit Suisse’s commitment to southeast Asia’s second-largest economy is undoubted. The Swiss firm’s plans to focus on the ultra- and super-high net-worth sectors and to mesh its private banking operations with its broader business are bearing fruit.

Bangkok Bank is a stalwart of Thailand’s banking community, renowned for being ultra-loyal to its customers, who have a happy tendency to return the favour.

Few Thai lenders – indeed, few regional financial institutions – can claim to have given as much back to the community over the years as Bank of Ayudhya. Since its formation 68 years ago, and long before the concept was given a name and an acronym, Bank of Ayudhya has remained resolutely committed to corporate social responsibility (CSR).

Bank of Ayudhya is not the largest bank in Thailand, but it’s by far the most nimble, and the lender that has invested heavily in its digital platform.

It’s hard not to like Hang Seng Bank, not least because their branches in stations across Hong Kong’s underground rail network make convenient places to meet.

HSBC likes to say it provides unparalleled one-stop services for its corporate clients, from deal origination and execution, through lending and syndication to sales and even research coverage. And it will do the entire train of transaction green, if you like.

Hong Kong is one of the world’s most wired markets; its internet users are more demanding than most. So Citi starts its digital offering from a good, if obvious, place. It wants its digital customer experience to be: ‘simple, intuitive, and seamless from beginning to end.’

In Hong Kong banking, ‘international’ pretty much means China. And ‘Chinese bank’ pretty much means Beijing’s note-issuing giant Bank of China. And with Beijing’s $1 trillion One Belt, One Road initiative in the pipeline, clients know that they are buying BOCI’s extensive connections in China. That was seen in 2016 when BOCI brought Bank of Tianjin to the Hong Kong market.

At first glance, the connection between an Indonesian tax amnesty and Singapore bank DBS’s recent push into Asian private banking isn’t apparent. But think again. Singaporean banks have seen billions of dollars leave their care since Jakarta gave Indonesians an amnesty to get their finances in order. Indonesian officials have said 57% of funds repatriated home came from Singapore.

Does China have a national dress? A national colour? Increasingly, the preferred garb is the gauze facemask, the colour not the vibrant vermillion of the national flag but dull beige, the shade of the film of filth that settles on surfaces – and in lungs – across the nation.

BDO Unibank, under chief executive Nestor Tan, has always been ahead of the curve. It was the first big Philippines lender to extend opening hours beyond the previous 3pm cut-off time, bringing banking to evening commuters and weekend shoppers. It was a pioneer in private banking and asset management, with a sprawling network of branches that includes 26 remittance and representative offices across Asia, the Middle East and Europe. And it’s a bank always willing to peer a little further down the line: witness its acquisition, completed in 2015, of One Network Bank, the country’s fastest-growing rural lender, with 105 branches in poorer regions, where per-capita income and the need for financial services are expanding rapidly.

There is a clear winner in this category. Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) has long been the best financial institution for corporates, banking the country’s largest firms, as well as many foreign multinationals. Well run, focused and steady – underlined by the fact that the current chief executive, Cezar Consing, in office since 2013, is only the 13th person to run the bank in its 162-year history – BPI is the epitome of stability in an often-turbulent world.