In a region where the greatest amount of wealth is in the hands of entrepreneurs, it is a ‘bank for entrepreneurs’ that many of those wealthy individuals need and that is Credit Suisse. It wins the award this year for Asia’s best bank for wealth management.

Businesses and banks in Belarus have faced a particularly tough challenge during the Covid-19 crisis due to the refusal of the government not only to impose any national restrictions but also to acknowledge the risks of the pandemic and implement any measures to mitigate its economic impact.

Canada’s biggest bank is a regular winner of the award for Canada’s best investment bank, but in 2020 it has clocked up another accolade for the first time since 2004.

Kenya’s Equity Bank stands out as a modern financial institution, a domestic champion and a regional player. As a result, it receives this year’s award for Africa’s best bank.

It was a year of milestones for Morgan Stanley in sustainability, a journey that began in 2013 with the establishment of the Sustainable Investing Institute under Audrey Choi, the bank’s chief sustainability officer.

There’s practically nothing that a North American small to medium-sized enterprise might want to do that Bank of America won’t be able to help with. Its strategy, built around six service areas, has been enduringly constant for five years, and it again wins the award for North America’s best bank for SMEs.

When a big US bank joins its peers around the world under an umbrella of responsible banking, it lifts the entire responsibility agenda – and this is exactly what Citi has done as an early signatory to the Principles of Responsible Banking (PRB) of the United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative.

“I think this crisis has shown why being with a firm focused on wealth management as a primary business and having a global perspective matters to clients,” says Tom Naratil, co-chief executive of UBS global wealth management (GWM) and president of UBS Americas.

Under the stewardship of chief executive Jean-Christophe Durand, formerly head of BNP Paribas’s Middle East and Africa operations, National Bank of Bahrain (NBB) embarked on a radical transformation programme in 2017 that delivered impressive results during the awards period.

DBS takes the award for Asia’s best bank for transaction services this year.

If there is one thing that will test a bank’s digital and technology platform it is a global pandemic. The investment that Bank of America has put into all of its digital offerings over the last few years became truly apparent over the first few months of 2020; and it wins the award for North America’s best digital bank.

At a time of global economic retrenchment, dollar volatility, slowing trade flows and border closures, Africa needs deeper localization of markets and financing. Standard Bank’s expertise in these fields makes it the clear choice for best investment bank in Africa this year.

To succeed, you have to be national: for Bill Demchak, chief executive of PNC Financial Services, it’s the mantra that has guided his strategy since taking over the reins of the firm in 2013.

When the Covid-19 pandemic reached Qatar and foreign exchange houses were forced to close, a customer contacted Commercial Bank of Qatar (CB) with concerns that his domestic workers were no longer able to send critical remittance payments to families in their home countries.

Ghana’s banking sector went through severe challenges in 2018 after the central bank’s asset quality review in 2017 revealed several structural challenges, including poor corporate governance, poor risk-management practices and regulatory non-compliance.

The list of deals from 2019 and 2020 – green bonds, social bonds, sustainability bonds and ESG-linked loans – goes on and on for HSBC in Asia under Jonathan Drew, managing director, sustainable finance.

Scotiabank Chile wins the award for the region’s best bank transformation.

There is fierce competition in sustainable finance in Western Europe, but this year one bank stands out for its commitment across all the sectors and countries in which it operates and for its work on ensuring the needs of both environment and society are addressed.

“People think the role of a bank is giving money, but actually what a bank does is build systems,” says Carl Manlan, chief operating officer of the Ecobank Foundation.

Another brisk year of M&A deal flow in CEE produced a clear winner on the advisory side. The best bank for advisory, Citi, dominated Dealogic’s league tables for the 12 months to the end of March, acting on 17 deals worth $17.7 billion, versus just $9.5 billion for its nearest rival.

Since joining Habib Bank in early 2018 as president and chief executive, former JPMorgan banker Muhammad Aurangzeb has transformed the Pakistan-based lender from the ground up.

Keeping supply chains functioning is essential for the success of CEE’s open, globally connected economies, and the banks best-placed to do so are those that combine deep local knowledge with international expertise.

Across sustainable finance and microfinance, BBVA is working to support greener and more inclusive economies. It wins the award for best bank in Latin America for sustainable finance.

The best digital bank award goes to Banco Inter, which has pulled off the difficult feat of keeping both its investors happy following its 2018 IPO – as it matures from a rapid growth story – and its clients.

Citi worked hard to mitigate the effects of the pandemic throughout central and Latin America and, given its history and geographical spread throughout the region, its impact was widespread.

While it was hard before, the Covid-19 pandemic will make it almost impossible for most European banks to earn their cost of equity any time soon.

As the biggest retail bank in a country where cash usage is lower than other big European states and where cloud-based neobanks have particular traction, Lloyds Banking Group faces an unusual digital banking challenge.

Kazakhstan’s banks faced a difficult challenge in the first two months of the pandemic. When president Kassym-Jomart Tokayev announced a state of emergency on March 16, he also unveiled plans to provide a support payment of KT42,500 ($106) to all citizens economically affected by the pandemic.

Goldman Sachs’s first ever investor day in January 2020 might have left more questions than answers around the firm’s forays into the brave new worlds of consumer and transaction banking. But one thing was unshakeable – its investment bank franchise. This year it is our choice as the US’s best investment bank.

Over the past decade Poland’s banks have consistently been at the head of the pack in Europe in terms of digitalization.