Mr. Wahid says that when the Association of Southeast Asian Nations economic committee is in place in 2015, intraregional trade and investments will increase exponentially.

WSJ: Maybank Spreads Its Arms Across Southeast Asia

The idea behind being there is that there will be greater intraregional trade and investments, therefore our customers will be doing business across the region.

WSJ: Maybank Spreads Its Arms Across Southeast Asia

Intraregional trade in Asia climbed from a fifth of the region's total trade after the second world war to a third in the 1980s to over half today.

ECONOMIST: Regional economic integration has a long, long way to go