Wed, Feb 16, 2022 page12

• E.Sun Financial plans to boost assets to NT$6tn

  BANK OPERATIONS: The firm said that its flagship unit would enlarge its assets mainly through organic growth, but it would also look for good M&A targets

  • By Kao Shih-ching / Staff reporter
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  E.Sun Financial Holding Co (玉山金控) aims to double its assets to NT$6 trillion (US$215.12 billion) in the next decade and hopes to boost its financial metrics via digitalization, the company told an investors’ conference in Taipei yesterday.

  Its flagship unit, E.Sun Commercial Bank (玉山銀行), launched in 1992, took 18 years to acquire NT$1 trillion of assets, seven years to reach NT$2 trillion and another three-and-a-half years to hit NT$3 trillion, E.Sun Commercial Bank chairman Joseph Huang (黃男州) said.

  “It seems that the pace [of asset accumulation] is faster,” Huang said. “We hope to add another NT$3 trillion in assets in the next decade.”

  

  E.Sun Commercial Bank chairman Joseph Huang speaks at an investors’ conference in Taipei on Aug. 18, 2020.

  Photo: Kelson Wang, Taipei Times

  The bank would enlarge its assets mainly through organic growth, but it would also look for good targets for mergers and acquisitions (M&A), he said.

  While E.Sun Financial’s M&A targets have focused on banks, such as Kaohsiung Business Bank (高雄企銀) and Cambodia-based Union Commercial Bank PLC, with its increased capital, it would now seek opportunities in the securities and insurance sectors, he said.

  E.Sun Commercial Bank is evaluating the policies of Web-only insurance firms, but has not made a decision to invest in them, Huang said.

  The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) in December last year said that it would allow companies to set up Web-based life or property insurance entities, but they must present an innovative and viable business model.

  E.Sun Financial, which is to celebrate its 30th anniversary this year, has set several goals for the next decade, including lifting its return on equity to 12 percent annually on average from 11 percent, raising the ratio of profit at overseas branches to 30 percent from 20 percent and increasing the ratio of net fee income to net revenue to 40 percent from 36 percent, Huang said.

  E.Sun Financial also aims to reduce its cost-to-income ratio to 50 percent from 58 percent, counting on digitalization to help reduce administrative costs and boost efficiency, he said.

  E.Sun Securities Co (玉山證券) has deployed artificial intelligence to help review account applications and quotas for margin trading, cutting the process to five minutes from 50, the parent company said.

  E.Sun Financial has an upbeat outlook for this year in light of potential interest rate hikes, recovering private consumption and strong lending momentum, Huang said.

  Credit card consumption fell 14.6 percent year-on-year to NT$455 billion last year due to withering private consumption, but it expects the segment to regain momentum and reach NT$500 billion this year, Huang said.

  Rate hikes would help banks garner more net interest income, which accounts for about 45 percent of E.Sun Bank’s total net revenue, while the bank also expects an 8 percent annual rise in lending, he said.
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