The Financial Supervisory Commission yesterday granted approval to two Taiwanese lenders to establish Chinese branches, after the financial regulator in June granted approval for four other lenders to upgrade their Chinese representative offices into branches.
In a statement posted on the commission’s Web site, the regulator said it gave the green light to Hua Nan Commercial Bank’s (華南商銀行) application to launch a branch in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province, and to Cathay United Bank’s (國泰世華銀行) plan to set up a branch in Shanghai.
The commission in March revised three statutes to allow local banks, securities houses and insurers to expand into China, while opening Taiwan’s financial sector to cross-strait investment. In June, it granted approval to Land Bank of Taiwan (土地銀行), Taiwan Cooperative Bank (合作金庫銀行), First Commercial Bank (第一銀行) and Chang Hwa Commercial Bank (彰化銀行) to upgrade their liaison offices in China into branches.
However, at that time, the commission rejected similar applications from Hua Nan and Cathay United, saying the two lenders needed to make further improvements in areas such as sales unit internal control mechanisms.
The commission said yesterday it finally approved the two lenders’ applications after they provided documents demonstrating their efforts to improve.
Hua Nan Financial Holding Co (華南金控), parent of Hua Nan bank, said in May that it hoped to open its Shenzhen branch by the end of the year as it targets China-based Taiwanese businesses in the Greater Pearl River Delta region, while Cathay Financial Holding Co (國泰金控) said in March it planned to upgrade its banking unit’s Chinese representative office into a branch before possibly establishing a wholly owned subsidiary there.
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