September 24, 2009

Welcome to an era of scarcity. If there’s one key concern bothering the bosses of global banking, it’s liquidity and the battering that the Frederic Oudea, Chairman & CEO, Societe Generale image of the banking industry has taken. Frederic Oudea, who took over as chairman and CEO of Societe Generale last year, believes that the future of the banking industry will hinge on liquidity management — not leverage ratios of banks or capital.

He’s also convinced that there’s no going back to the era of growth, fuelled by borrowings for either developed economies, or global banks. “Thanks to the massive intervention by governments, the situation has stabilised. My conviction is that it remains fragile, the cost of capital will remain expensive and liquidity will remain scarce for the time to come,” he said.Mr Oudea is also convinced that the future growth in the world will come from emerging markets in East Europe, Africa, Russia, India and China.