The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) said yesterday it would consider providing incentives for potential buyers of two insurers put under government receivership earlier this week.
Overseas investment ceiling restrictions and regulations on insurance companies’ risk-based capital requirements may be relaxed for the purchase of Global Life Insurance Co (國寶人壽) and Singfor Life Insurance Co (幸福人壽), FSC Chairman William Tseng (曾銘宗) told reporters yesterday.
Other beneficial terms are also on the cards as the government seeks to lower the financial burden of bailing the companies out, the Chinese-language Apple Daily’s online news site quoted Tseng as saying.
On Tuesday, the commission announced the government had taken over the two life insurers through the semi-official Insurance Stabilization Fund in a bid to prevent their financial conditions worsening further.
As of June 30, Global Life’s negative net worth had ballooned to NT$25.2 billion (US$838.7 million) from NT$100 million in 2006, while that of Singfor had expanded to NT$23.9 billion from NT$1.7 billion during the same period, the commission’s data showed.
The Insurance Stabilization Fund is expected to hold public auctions next year to find suitors for the firms.
Market watchers are speculating that Fubon Financial Holding Co (富邦金控) and Cathay Financial Holding Co (國泰金控) are interested in the two insurers. Other potential buyers are Mega Financial Holding Co (兆豐金控), E.Sun Financial Holding Co (玉山金控) and China Development Financial Holding Co (中華開發金控).
Based on the statistics compiled by the commission, some policyholders had gone to the two companies' offices around the country over the last two days to terminate their policies or get loans off their policies as a way to get cash from the two insurers in case they went bankrupt.
The commission said policyholders had terminated a total of NT$143.24 million in policies with the two companies and obtained NT$79.62 million in loans since Wednesday.
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