Yuanta Securities Co (元大寶來證券), the nation’s largest brokerage by market share, plans to expand into Southeast Asia in line with its ambition to grow into a regional player after acquiring a majority stake in a South Korean peer, vice chairman Huang Guh-bin (黃古彬) said yesterday.
The main unit of Yuanta Financial Holding Co (元大金控) has authorized a financial consultancy to scout for acquisition targets on its behalf in Singapore, Myanmar and Vietnam to capitalize on those countries’ rapid economic growth, Huang said.
While emerging markets promise great business potential, they are prone to volatility and the company will factor in risks involved before reaching a decision, he added.
“We are looking for acquisition targets that would allow Yuanta Securities to have 100 percent control, not just chances for strategic partnership or capital investment,” Huang said on the sidelines of a product launch.
The brokerage is on course to integrate South Korea’s Tongyang Securities Inc and rename it Yuanta Securities later this quarter, so it can take advantage of Tongyang’s overseas units to expand in Cambodia and the Philippines, in addition to the South Korean market.
Tongyan owns a subsidiary in Cambodia and a savings bank in the Philippines, giving Yuanta Securities immediate access to the two emerging markets.
Yuanta Financial is also interested in growing its banking arm, Yuanta Commercial Bank (元大銀行), but is to maintain the status quo in the foreseeable future for its life insurance subsidiary, Yuanta Life Insurance Co (元大人壽), another executive said on condition of anonymity.
The conglomerate posted NT$6.04 billion (US$201.6 million) in net income for the first six months of this year, a jump of 79.19 percent from the same period last year, data on its Web site showed.
The figure translates into earnings per share of NT$0.61, compared with NT$0.32 a year earlier.
Huang attributed the earnings pickup to a series of regulatory relaxations that have helped the local bourse to almost emerge from the disruptions caused by the imposition of a capital gains tax on securities transactions, although the stalled ratification of the cross-strait service trade pact is causing uncertainty, he said.
Once the stalemate is resolved, Yuanta Securities would be able to tap the Chinese market from the city of Shenzhen, Huang said.
KGI Securities Co (凱基證券), another leading brokerage firm in Taiwan, on Monday announced plans to partner with Chinese tourism group Jin Jiang International Co (錦江國際) in setting up a securities company in Shanghai.
The forthcoming brokerage would have capital of 800 million yuan (US$128 million), with KGI to own a 51 percent stake, it said in a stock filing, adding that the two sides have inked a memorandum of understanding on the matter.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained