AFAIK, for HSBC and SCB, you only need to maintain PB status in just one country. If you have oversea accounts with HSBC/SCB, they can be upgraded to PB status without fulfilling the minimum PB balance requirement in that particular country. For this reason, maintaining the PB status in MY is more attractive as the minimum PB requirement is usually the lowest among all jurisdictions.

For Citibank, you would have to meet the PB minimum requirement in all countries where you intend to have PB status.
Stand to be corrected if bank policy has changed.

This post has been edited by hyperzz: Jul 3 2019, 11:22 PM

I have no experience with SC SG. But I think you should ask your RM in SG instead of asking SC MY directly.

One of my friends has PB with SC MY. His RM helped him to open account with SC in SG, HK and China. All accounts come with PB status without the local minimum balance requirement. In some cases, he still has to meet the local RM face-to-face as part of the account opening process, which requires cross-border travel.

With HSBC, it is clearly stated in their website that overseas account opening is one of the perks of being a PB customer. SC actually offers a similar service but this is not clearly communicated in their website. What I said in post #1867 is based on the experience of someone who has already done that.

However, cross border transfer between SC bank accounts is not free, even with PB status.

Can't comment on this as I rarely perform forex transaction through a bank. Mostly use fintech instead.

You can refer to my past posts. It's probably no appropriate to discuss about them on this PB thread.