Kuwait, April 5, 2011: Gulf Bank announced that it has received the 2010 Quality Recognition Award for achieving Straight through Processing Rate in excess of 98% for USD Dollar payments sent to Citibank NA, New York throughout the year. Mr. Steve Donovan, Head of Middle East & Pakistan, Global Transaction Services at Citibank presented the award to Mrs. Mona Mansour, Deputy General Manager-Operations at Gulf Bank's headquarters on Sunday, 27th March 2011. Mr. Khaled Al Mutawa, General Manager- International Banking & Investments said: 'We are proud to be recognized by such a renowned financial institution as Citibank, and very honored to receive this award today. Gulf Bank originally set out to make a long-term commitment to customer service, growth and product innovation. Receiving this award is an acknowledgment for being one of the top correspondent banks. It reinforces our reputation as a market leader in operations, service and quality.

Today's award comes on top of a number of other major awards which Gulf Bank has recently received. These include the recent 'International Excellence in Retail Financial Services' Award from The Asian Banker, 'Best Retail Bank' award for superior customer service and innovation in retail banking, 'Best Contact & Service Center', 'Best Public Relations Campaign for Corporate Social Responsibility', 'Best New Product' for the innovative Al Danah account, 'Best Employer' Award in the GCC at the GCC Human Resource Excellence Awards, Localization Award from the GCC Council of Ministers of Labor and Social Affairs for the 6th consecutive year and 'Best Loyalty Program' award and 'Best Customer Interactivity' award at the Second Annual Competition for 'Banking Web' awards. The Citi Performance Excellence Award is presented to leading financial institutions worldwide which have state-of-the-art international 'straight-through-processing' (STP) electronic payment services and meet Citibank's stringent correspondent banking and processing accuracy criteria.