Far Eastern International Bank (FEIB, 遠東國際商銀) yesterday became the nation’s first lender to gain regulatory approval to offer open banking services.
The medium-sized lender said it had been given the go-ahead by the Financial Supervisory Commission on Thursday to launch an account integration app, a new service provided in conjunction with affiliate Far EasTone Telecommunications Co (遠傳電信).
The move makes FEIB the nation’s first third-party service provider, as technology is reshaping the banking industry and more customers prefer online transactions, FEIB digital banking division head Simon Tai (戴松志) said.
Photo courtesy of Far Eastern International Bank
The new app enables customers to integrate their accounts at different banks, allowing them to manage their savings accounts, bills, credit cards and funds without having to open multiple apps or windows, Tai said.
The app uses artificial intelligence to recommend the most favorable options for customers when making wealth management decisions or choosing banking services, the Taipei-based lender said.
FEIB was able to steal a march on its peers in open banking due mainly to its collaboration with Far EasTone, which does not keep a record of customers’ banking details or passwords, maintaining the safety of transactions, Tai said.
The lender has achieved significant progress in digital transformation, with 93 percent of its transactions taking place over the Internet this year, up from 90 percent last year, he said.
FEIB has more than 40,000 digital banking accounts, which function as an entry-level product to help the bank gain more business, much like credit cards did in the past, Tai said, adding that the bank plans to introduce more digital services later this month.
The bank posted net income of NT$2.33 billion (US$81.93 million) in the first three quarters of the year, or earnings per share of NT$0.68, FEIB president Thomas Chou (周添財) said.
That suggests a 20 percent full-year retreat from a year earlier, as the banking sector takes a hit from the COVID-19 pandemic, Chou said.
Increased market liquidity is weighing on loan growth and increasing the costs of provisions, but FEIB has fared better than its peers on non-performing loans so far this year, he said.
Cairo’s new monorail slices across the city skyline, running above the familiar chaos of blaring horns and aging buses’ exhaust fumes that mark rush hour below. The US$4.5 billion monorail, opened this month, is among Egypt’s most prominent new transport projects, part of a debt-funded infrastructure drive criticized for sapping state finances while bringing limited benefits to most of the country’s 109 million people. “It feels like you’re in a different country,” said Ramy Sayed, a restaurant manager, aboard a driverless Innovia 300 train. “No noise, no traffic, we’re not used to this.” The eastern line runs 56km from the bustling middle-class
Taiwanese firms have increased investment in the Philippines in recent years as Manila’s ties with Washington deepen and global supply chains continue to shift away from China, an expert at the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The Philippines had not been among Taiwanese investors’ top choices in Southeast Asia, CIER Taiwan ASEAN Studies Center director Kristy Hsu (徐遵慈) said at a seminar in Taipei. However, Taiwan’s investment in the country has grown significantly since the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching US $257 million last year, a high in recent years, she said. Although Taiwan’s total investment in the Philippines still lags
Intel Corp regards Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) as a longstanding partner, as the US chipmaker would continue outsourcing production of advanced chips to TSMC, Intel chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) said yesterday. “I don’t look at people as competitors. I look at the collaboration... Nvidia is also, you know, a good friend,” Tan told a news conference following his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei. “It’s a very trusted partnership for us... We are a big, top customer for them, and we’re going to continue doing that,” he said, referring to TSMC, the world’s largest foundry
Artificial intelligence (AI) agents would supplant smartphones as the center of people’s digital lives, fundamentally reshaping personal devices and driving a major computing upgrade cycle, Qualcomm Inc CEO Cristiano Amon said yesterday. In his keynote speech for this year’s Computex trade show in Taipei, Amon said that the rise of "agentic AI" — AI systems capable of reasoning, planning and carrying out tasks autonomously — would transform how people interact with technology across phones, PCs, vehicles and wearable devices. Describing the technology as the next major evolution in computing, Amon said that "2026 is the year of agents.” For decades, smartphones have sat
RSS