“I plan to use this prize, along with what I had put aside to start my business;”   “I have no idea what I will do with my prize as yet, but I plan to put it in my savings and use it wisely:” “I have a project that I am working on but I had to hold on it, with this prize, I can start it going again.”

These were the sentiments of the 3 prize winners in the CIBC Caribbean Joy of Giving Christmas Competition, as they were allowed to choose their winnings from behind a mystery card.

The three, Diquone Roberts, Waynel Lynch and Dwayne Hood were randomly selected from the hundreds of clients of the bank who were automatically entered in the competition, after taking out a personal loan, car, land loan or mortgage, during the period October 2024 to January 2025. This was eventually extended further.

In explaining why the Joy of Giving Competition was coming to a climax so close to Easter, the new Head of Country for Barbados Kemar Polius said “As you are aware, the process to onboard a land loan or a mortgage, involves external parties including valuers and attorneys, so to give our land loan and mortgage clients an equal opportunity for eligibility, it was necessary to delay the draw by a few weeks.”

The competition gave clients an opportunity to win $3,000, $5,000 or $10,000 in cash when they took out a loan from the bank and their eligibility was confirmed when the loan was approved.

The three lucky Barbados winners were invited to a short ceremony at the bank where they saw three bank cards on stands.  Individually, they were invited to pick one of the cards and remove the sticker on the back to reveal the hidden value mounted there.

As the suspense in the room started to build, Dwayne was the first to pull the card in the middle.  That revealed him $3,000 in cash. The three cards were then removed to another room and were shuffled. Waynel, a client of CIBC Caribbean Wildey branch was up next, and she pulled the card to the left. This revealed the $10,000 amount as everyone in the room cheered for her good luck.

Again, the cards were removed to another room, shuffled and returned and Diquone, who conducted his business at Broad Street, pulled the one to the far right which, to a gasp of surprise from all in the room revealed another $10,000.

When asked how they felt about winning, they all said how surprised they were, having never won anything before, and they thought it a prank someone was playing on them when they got the call, until they got the official email from the bank confirming their good fortune.

Each of the winners was presented with their prize by their Loans Officer and a Senior Executive of the bank.

These three winners won the Barbados segment of the regional competition, which took place in nine of the bank’s 10 territories.