The nation’s listed companies raised about 28 percent more funds on the open market last year from both domestic and overseas investors than a year ago, reflecting a steady growth in the funding needed by companies amid a recovering economy, according to the latest data released by the Financial Supervisory Commission yesterday.
Listed companies raised a total of NT$615.739 billion (US$21.2 billion) in both domestic and foreign capital markets last year, up 27.64 percent from the NT$482.41 billion they obtained in 2009, the commission said in a statement.
In terms of the number of fund-raising cases on the public market, there were 413 cases last year, up from 275 reported a year earlier, the statement said.
However, the total amount of funding raised through private placement deals reached NT$91.35 billion last year, down 44.28 percent from NT$163.943 billion in 2009, the FSC data showed.
The ratio of private placements to total funding was 12.92 percent last year, down from 25.36 percent in 2009 and 26.03 percent in 2008, the data showed.
The declines in private placements last year came after the financial regulator imposed tougher measures on listed companies seeking to raise funds through private placements to better safeguard the public interest, unless the firms showed themselves to be experiencing financial and operational difficulties and are in urgent need of capital injection.
The strong equity market last year was another reason that listed companies decided to raise money on the open markets rather than via private placements, the commission said.
As for the purpose of the fund raising, 35.06 percent of listed firms said they needed fresh capital to expand factory facilities and 32.06 percent sought to use the money to strengthen working capital. Electronics companies led in raising funds last year, followed by plastics manufacturers, the commission said.
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