Taiwan’s listed financial holding companies posted a combined net profit of NT$27.99 billion (US$871.3 million) last month, up 213.6 percent from a year earlier, driven by earnings contributed by their banking arms, companies’ regulatory filings showed.
Fubon Financial Holding Co (富邦金控) and Cathay Financial Holding Co (國泰金控) posted earnings of NT$5.4 billion and NT$4.77 billion respectively, making them the two most profitable financial conglomerates.
Their banking arms Taipei Fubon Bank (台北富邦銀行) and Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) continued to benefit from earlier interest rate hikes at home and abroad, the companies said.
Photo: CNA
In addition, their life insurance subsidiaries, Fubon Life Insurance Co (富邦人壽) and Cathay Life Insurance Co (國泰人壽), received a boost in value for their US dollar-based assets at a time when global funds continued to flow to greenback-denominated investment tools that pay higher interest rates.
CTBC Financial Holding Co (中信金控) reported earnings of NT$4.46 billion last month, ranking third as the company benefited from improving lending, wealth management and credit card operations at its banking subsidiary CTBC Bank (中國信託銀行), the company said.
Its life insurance subsidiary Taiwan Life Insurance Co (台灣人壽) also made significant income contributions from selling assets, CTBC Financial said.
Among the 14 financial holding companies, only Taishin Financial Holding Co (台新金) was in the red last month as the company posted a net loss of NT$730 million due to lower investment gains at its subsidiary Taishin Venture Capital Investment Co (台新創投).
Overall, the 14 financial holding companies posted a combined net profit of NT$339.44 billion in the first nine months of the year, representing an 8.3 percent increase from a year earlier, as the sector emerged from COVID-19 pandemic insurance claims.
The figures might exceed the NT$400 billion mark this year in the absence of black swan events, analysts said.
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