Guangdong Development Bank (廣東發展銀行) is expected to approve the appointment of Morris Li (利明献), chairman of Citibank Taiwan Ltd (台灣花旗), as president tomorrow, the Chinese-language Commercial Times reported yesterday.
The newspaper also said that the Citibank Taiwan’s president, Victor Kuan (管國霖), was likely to take over as chairman, without identifying its sources.
Citibank Taiwan’s US parent, Citigroup Inc, has a 20 percent stake in the Chinese bank.
Calls to Li, Kuan and the bank’s spokesperson went unanswered at press time yesterday.
The report said Li would replace Michael Zink as the Chinese bank’s president and serve under its chairman, Dong Jianyue (董建岳), who hoped to leverage off Li’s financial expertise to facilitate the bank’s plan to complete its initial public offerings by the end of the year.
Once his appointment is finalized, Li will be based in both Beijing and Guangzhou and take charge of mapping out a plan for the Chinese bank to accelerate its expansion there, the report said.
Under Li’s leadership since late 2005, Citibank Taiwan — which completed its acquisition of the Taipei-based Bank of Overseas Chinese (華僑銀行) and became a local subsidiary of Citigroup in August last year — has delivered robust earnings, especially in the last year when its US parent was among those worst hit by the subprime mortgage-triggered financial crisis.
Founded in 1988, Guangdong Development Bank has more than 500 sales outlets in China, including 25 branches there.
As of the end of last year, the Chinese bank has total assets of 666.5 billion yuan (US$97.6 billion) with a net worth of 34.3 billion yuan, the report said.
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