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Executive Column: ‘Underinvested’ Indonesia deserves focus, Citi APAC CEO says
On a recent visit to Indonesia, Citi Asia Pacific CEO Peter Babej met government officials and business partners in the country. During his two-day stay, the banker spoke with The Jakarta Post’s Vincent Fabian Thomas on July 21 about banking industry opportunities in Asia, even as a threat of stagflation looms over other regions of the world.
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Citi Asia Pacific CEO Peter Babej speaks with "The Jakarta Post" at Citibank Tower in Jakarta on July 22. (Citibank Indonesia/Public Relations )
On a recent visit to Indonesia, Citi Asia Pacific CEO Peter Babej met government officials and business partners in the country.
During his two-day stay, the banker spoke with The Jakarta Post’s Vincent Fabian Thomas on July 21 about banking industry opportunities in Asia, even as a threat of stagflation looms over other regions of the world.
Question: What is the state of the global economy, given the threat of stagflation and the impact of rising interest rates?
Answer: I think we've got a set of risks that's unlike what we've seen in a very, very long time.
One of them is inflation. There’s no clear consensus on where the journey goes, but there was an increasing belief that inflation has become embedded in expectations. So, it’s something that, unless it's addressed head-on, we can expect to be with us for quite a while.
The Russia-Ukraine war obviously has exacerbated that because it’s put a lot of pressure on energy prices. And we don’t expect that that goes away overnight, either.
Increasingly, a lot of people believe that we are heading into a recession, which is a risk that we need to manage.
