In Memoriam: Peter Dodds, 81

Led Chase Merchant Bank in Malaysia

 
 
Peter George Ridley Dodds, who served Chase Manhattan in London, New York and Malaysia between 1970 and 1980, died at his home in Plymouth, MA, on March 17, 2024. He was 81.
 
Dodds was born in 1942 in Bangor, County Down, Northern Ireland, where his father, a naval surgeon, was stationed during World War II. The family subsequently moved to North Yorkshire. Dodds acquired a BA in Economics from Durham University and qualified as a Chartered Accountant in January 1970.
 
Dodds was invited in May 1970 to join Chase's Global Credit Training Program in London, where he made friends and contacts who would remain important to him for the rest of his life. He fondly said: "Wherever you found the Chase ‘mafia', you found a collegial group that spoke the same business language, that thought about credit in a similar way.”
 
He moved with his young family to New York in 1971, when the World Trade Center was starting to point skyward. They lived on Staten Island, before moving to Princeton. He left Chase in 1974 and spent two years at A.G. Becker, then a commercial paper powerhouse, before returning to Chase.
 
Dodds then served as Chief Executive of Amanah Chase Merchant Bank in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It was the beginning of his involvement with Asia, which continued into retirement. He was recalled to New York at the end of his assignment but longed for the excitement and challenge of an overseas posting, thus joining the now late-lamented Baring Brothers in Hong Kong in 1980. He returned to New York in 1983 to serve as Vice President of Saudi International Bank, a joint venture between JP Morgan and the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency {Central Bank).
 
Dodds once wrote, "Chase has played an absolutely central role in my career and life. Many enduring friendships, all over the world, are the product of my time at the Bank, as is a sense of great pride at having been involved with a unique and extraordinary institution that allowed me to completely change the direction of my life.” 
 
In 1988, he joined Midland Montagu in New York as its Chief Investment Officer for Problem Asset Portfolio Management and Disposal, where he reconnected with ex-Chase colleagues. Eventually, HSBC acquired Midland in 1992. This marked the start of his 15-year journey at Standard Chartered Bank, during which he held senior risk and business management roles at its Wholesale Bank and saw his posting to Singapore in 2003. Dodds retired as its Global Head of Commodity Finance in March 2008.
 
In November 2009, he began the process of moving to Boston, where his children and his grandchildren lived. He remained active in the world of finance by conducting Credit and Risk training courses for Standard Chartered Bank and also worked with the Myanmar-based mission of Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH on a project focused on developing the banking sector for the Central Bank of Myanmar. (Click here to read an article Dodds wrote about that experience.)
 
Peter was a volunteer mentor at SCORE, a non-profit organization that provides advice to small business owners from 2012 to 2020. In 2017, he obtained his Real Estate license and had the pleasure of working with his daughter in the business from June 2022 until his passing.
 
He was preceded in death by his wife, Madeline Louise Dodds, who died in 2002. His survivors include his second wife, Katherine Ong Dodds, two children, George A. C. Dodds and Lucy Dodds Loring (Jon) and five grandchildren.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Remembrances
 
Please send remembrances to
news@chasealum.org
 
 
From Gary Olson (1972 training class cc2 I think):  Will miss you Peter. It was great knowing you.
 
 
From Hans van den Houten: Good memories will remain of Peter. He was a cordial friend during our time at Chase and thereafter. As chief executive at Amanah Chase Merchant Bank in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, he managed a new Chase organization, which I was responsible for having put on the map, while in Corporate Development. Peter and I stayed close for many years, and the many lunches we had will always be remembered. May he rest in peace.