The board of Chang Hwa Bank (彰化銀行) decided in an ad hoc meeting on Saturday to hire financial advisers to decide the terms of a share swap plan with its biggest shareholder Taishin Financial Holding Co (台新金控), the nation's second-largest financial group by assets.
However, the Ministry of Finance has questioned the board's decision, citing "irregularities" in the handling of the meeting's procedures and called on the bank to convene another meeting.
Taishin Financial, the nation's second-largest credit card issuer, holds a 25 percent stake in and controls eight of the 15 board seats of Chang Hwa, the nation's seventh-largest lender by assets. The Ministry of Finance has an 18 percent stake in the bank.
Welcoming the board's decision, Taishin Financial said it would hire its own financial advisers to conduct a fair evaluation, according to Carol Lai (
But "we have no timetable [for the completion of the share swap] at the moment," Lai said in a telephone interview yesterday, dismissing a local newspaper report that the share swap will be completed within a year.
The Chinese-language Commercial Times reported yesterday that the two companies would proceed with the share swap within the next six months to a year to complete the acquisition, citing Taishin Financial chairman Thomas Wu (
But Lai said that Taishin Financial will have Chang Hwa delisted from the Taiwan Stock Exchange after completing the share swap.
After the swap, Taishin Financial's banking subsidiary, Taishin International Bank (
However, Chang Hwa's board meeting on Saturday did not proceed as smoothly as expected, as the four government-appointed board directors and one private board member walked out to express their dissatisfaction with what they termed "improper procedures."
According to a report by the Chinese-language Apple Daily, "the walkout was prompted by the discussion of the share swap issue, which was not originally included in the ad hoc meeting's agenda.
"The government does not oppose hiring financial advisers to conduct a share swap evaluation, but does question the procedure," the report quoted Vice Minister of Finance Liu Teng-cheng (
The ministry also issued a statement last night, saying that there were some "irregularities" in Saturday's meeting, such as the changes in the meeting's agenda, and had relayed its concern to Chang Hwa and Taishin Financial.
The ministry further asked Chang Hwa to convene a new board meeting in compliance with regulatory procedures.
Meanwhile, Wu said that Taishin Financial has invested more than NT$40 billion (US$1.2 billion) in its bid to acquire Chang Hwa.
The company is under growing pressure to expedite the merger with Chang Hwa Bank in the wake of Standard Chartered Bank's recent outright acquisition of Hsinchu International Bank (新竹國際商銀), which runs 83 branches nationwide.
"I can hardly sleep at night every time I think of how local banks can compete with foreign rivals with their aggressive expansion plans," the Commercial Times quoted Wu as saying.
The inclusion of Chang Hwa into Taishin Financial's umbrella will boost its total number of branches to 270 -- the highest in the country -- enhancing its customer-sharing and cross-selling opportunities, Wu said.
Chang Hwa's six overseas branches and one representative office in China can also help Taishin Financial's overseas development, he added.
Taishin Financial also called on the government to keep its promise of support for the winner of the bid for Chang Hwa. The company outbid six competitors with an offer of NT$36.6 billion (US$1.1 billion) for a 22 percent stake in Chang Hwa in July last year.
Greek tourism student Katerina quit within a month of starting work at a five-star hotel in Halkidiki, one of the country’s top destinations, because she said conditions were so dire. Beyond the bad pay, the 22-year-old said that her working and living conditions were “miserable and unacceptable.” Millions holiday in Greece every year, but its vital tourism industry is finding it harder and harder to recruit Greeks to look after them. “I was asked to work in any department of the hotel where there was a need, from service to cleaning,” said Katerina, a tourism and marketing student, who would
i Gasoline and diesel prices at fuel stations are this week to rise NT$0.1 per liter, as tensions in the Middle East pushed crude oil prices higher last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) said yesterday. International crude oil prices last week rose for the third consecutive week due to an escalating conflict between Israel and Iran, as the market is concerned that the situation in the Middle East might affect crude oil supply, CPC and Formosa said in separate statements. Front-month Brent crude oil futures — the international oil benchmark — rose 3.75 percent to settle at US$77.01
RECORD LOW: Global firms’ increased inventories, tariff disputes not yet impacting Taiwan and new graduates not yet entering the market contributed to the decrease Taiwan’s unemployment rate last month dropped to 3.3 percent, the lowest for the month in 25 years, as strong exports and resilient domestic demand boosted hiring across various sectors, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday. After seasonal adjustments, the jobless rate eased to 3.34 percent, the best performance in 24 years, suggesting a stable labor market, although a mild increase is expected with the graduation season from this month through August, the statistics agency said. “Potential shocks from tariff disputes between the US and China have yet to affect Taiwan’s job market,” Census Department Deputy Director Tan Wen-ling
As they zigzagged from one machine to another in the searing African sun, the workers were covered in black soot. However, the charcoal they were making is known as “green,” and backers hope it can save impoverished Chad from rampant deforestation. Chad, a vast, landlocked country of 19 million people perched at the crossroads of north and central Africa, is steadily turning to desert. It has lost more than 90 percent of its forest cover since the 1970s, hit by climate change and overexploitation of trees for household uses such as cooking, officials say. “Green charcoal” aims to protect what
RSS