Busines Briefs

■ Banking
Forex reserves fall

The nation's foreign-exchange reserves fell last month for the first month-on-month drop in more than four years, the central bank said. The reserves, the third-highest in the world, fell to US$253.56 billion (NT$8.05 trillion) from a record US$253.62 billion in June. The decline was caused by the nation's shrinking trade surplus this year, as well as an increase in the amount of money Taiwanese tourists spent abroad during the summer break, the peak travel season. The last time the country's foreign exchange reserves experienced a month-on-month decline was in June 2001, a spokeswoman said. In the first half of this year, the trade surplus totaled just US$420 million, compared with a US$3.89 billion surplus in the same period last year.

■ Finance

Waterland to hold meeting

Waterland Financial Holding Co (國票金控), the nation's smallest financial service provider, is likely to hold another board meeting on Friday to decide on the pending appointment of its new chairman, after obtaining the Financial Supervisory Commission's approval for the posting on Thursday. The report said Victor Liu (劉維琪), Waterland's chairman-to-be, would seek consensus on his appointment from major shareholders with an all-out effort before convening the board meeting. The management reshuffle at Waterland's subsidiaries, including International Bill Finance Corp (國際票券) and Waterland Securities Co (國票證券), will be discussed once consensus is reached. Nice Group (耐斯) took five of the 11 seats on Waterland's board on June 29 after months of intense competition with another investor group led by Hung San-hsiung (洪三雄). Hung, chairman of Taiwan Financial Asset Services Corp (台灣金服公司), and his supporters grabbed four seats. The Ministry of Finance controls the remainder.