The board accepted his resignation as vice chairman and executive director, along with his chairmanship of subsidiary CBC Properties and Computer Center Inc., effective Oct. 7, an internal company announcement showed.
Dee, who was 90 as of the SM Group-backed lender’s latest annual report, remains connected to the institution as chair emeritus.
“The board hereby confers upon Mr. Dee the honorary title of chairman emeritus, effective today, October 7, 2026, in recognition of his long and valuable services, his immense contributions, and his invaluable counsel, guidance and support, which have enabled and continue to enable the Bank to grow and establish itself as a leading provider of quality services, while upholding the highest standards of professionalism, integrity, ethics and corporate responsibility,” a portion of the company announcement showed.
From family bank to modern lender
Dee joined the board in 1969 and later served 22 years as chairman before becoming vice chairman in 2011.
He belongs to the family that helped establish Chinabank in Binondo in 1920, when Dee C. Chuan and Albino SyCip led a group of Filipino-Chinese businessmen in founding the lender, now the country’s fourth-largest private bank.
Dee recalled in Chinabank’s centennial history that he pushed the lender beyond highly centralized decision-making, arguing that growth required greater delegation and professional management.
The same corporate history recounts how he accompanied his father to Taiwan in 1975 to negotiate a reduction in a foreign shareholder’s stake, helping Chinabank meet Filipino ownership requirements and unlock wider branch expansion.
That transformation helped the lender build a deeper executive bench and grow from a small branch network into one of the country’s largest private banks.
Taipan Henry Sy Sr.'s SM Group entered Chinabank in 2004, but members of the founding Dee family continued to hold key board and management roles as the lender expanded under its new shareholder structure.
—Edited by Miguel R. Camus
