Offshore bourse
Worried about the impact of the trend on local capital markets, Taiwan's financial regulator has been promoting a foreign currency-denominated offshore bourse, in the hopes of luring overseas Taiwanese companies to make their IPOs in their home country.
The offshore bourse comprises a futures, bond and stock market, and the futures exchange opened for business in March.
The Financial Supervisory Commission said earlier this year that it planned to launch the bond market in the fourth quarter of this year.
The Conference on Sustaining Taiwan's Economic Development, which ended Friday, has placed the launching of the most-anticipated market, and offshore stock exchange, under the "consensus" list, which means that the Cabinet will push forward this suggestion as soon as possible.
Still, the outlook for this offshore stock exchange remains uncertain, due to the knotty issue of the China-bound investment cap. The Taiwan Solidarity Union's (TSU) strong opposition at the conference to relaxing the cap ensured that it did not make it onto the "consensus" list, but instead was listed in the "other opinions" category. TSU representatives on Friday walked out of the conference session to protest the government's intent to relax cross-strait trade and transport restrictions, which they say will endanger Taiwan's sovereignty and security.
For Vedan International (Holding) Ltd (味丹國際控股), which has set up footholds in Vietnam and China's food markets, the government needs to do more to attract Taiwanese firms operating overseas.
"More liberalization is required for Taiwan's capital market to draw overseas Taiwanese firms, especially those that have a plan for China's market," said Michael Hsieh (
Vedan International became a publicly traded company in Hong Kong in 2003.
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