Among Taiwan’s 32 foreign banks, Standard Bank of South Africa Ltd’s Taipei branch posted the highest ratio of non-performing loans (NPLs) at 32.59 percent in November last year, the Financial Supervisory Commission’s latest figures showed yesterday.
The bank racked up NT$4.3 billion (US$135 million) in outstanding loans, NT$1.39 billion of which went sour as of November, the data showed.
“We will soon ask the bank’s parent group to reinforce its capital structure after it reported suffering a setback in raising funds last year over frozen securitization activities,” said Jean Chiu (邱淑貞), deputy director-general of the commission’s banking bureau.
The South African bank incurred NT$167 million in pre-tax losses at the same time, the commission’s figures said.
The remaining 31 foreign banks maintained an NPL ratio of less than 3 percent, including 28 banks with an NPL ratio of less than 1 percent, the data showed.
The foreign banking sector as a whole reported a 0.96 percent NPL ratio, down from 1.28 percent a year earlier.
Meanwhile, ABN AMRO Taiwan reported NT$13.9 billion in pre-tax losses — the worst among the 32 foreign banks — as of November, the data showed, whereas Citibank Taiwan (花旗銀行) outperformed its peers with NT$6.8 billion in pre-tax profit in the first 11 months of last year, followed by HSBC Taiwan’s (匯豐銀行) NT$4.3 billion, the data showed.
Overall, foreign banks reported NT$12.6 billion in pre-tax profit, down by NT$17 billion from a year earlier, with a combined net worth of NT$71.5 billion in the first 11 months of last year.
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