Executives of Macquarie Bank Ltd, the largest investment bank in Australia, called yesterday on high-ranking government officials, possibly to talk about the bank's proposed investment in CKS International Airport. Both parties, however, were unwilling to elaborate on the exact contents of the meeting.
"Vice Premier [Wu Rong-i (吳榮義)] met with representatives from Macquarie Bank today in one of his non-public appointments ? and he was accompanied by officials of the Council for Economic Planning and Development and the Ministry of Transportation and Communications," Wu's office confirmed with the Taipei Times in a phone interview yesterday.
The commission Chairman Hu Sheng-cheng's (胡勝正) office, however, said it was just a courtesy call.
Macquarie Bank, which last week successfully acquired Denmark's Copenhagen Airport, is reportedly highly interested in acquiring CKS airport for between NT$100 billion (US$3 billion) to NT$200 billion and Taipei City's public parking lots for between NT$10 billion and NT$20 billion.
The deals, if they were to materialize, would mark the first sale of national infrastructure to overseas investors in Taiwan.
Local Chinese-language newspapers reported earlier this week that Nicholas Moore, head of Macquarie Bank's investment banking group, would meet with Wu yesterday to pave the way for the investment.
“I can not confirm the reports,” and the link between Moore's Taiwan visit
and the reported investment are just speculation, Macquarie Group's public
affairs official Lotte Pang said on phone yesterday.
“We will continue to evaluate assets in Taiwan and around the globe,” Pang
said.
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