The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) fined financial institutions and publicly listed firms NT$129.02 million (US$4.03 million) during the first eight months of this year for internal control, financial services misconduct and corporate governance-related breaches, data released last week by the commission showed.
The fines were down 30.42 percent from the NT$184.42 million imposed during the same period last year and were less than half — 46.97 percent — of the commission’s target of NT$274.68 million for the whole of this year, the commission said.
The commission attributed the decline in fines to a higher comparison base last year, when it meted out heavy penalties to a financial holding company for corporate governance breaches after a major shareholder was found to have improperly interfered in the company’s operations, as well as to several banks for employee involvement in assisting fraud rings or theft from clients.
Photo: Kelson Wang, Taipei Times
Among the commission’s three major subordinate agencies, the Banking Bureau and the Insurance Bureau imposed a lower total amount of fines in the first eight months of this year compared with the same period last year, while the Securities and Futures Bureau imposed slightly more.
In the January-to-August period, the financial penalties imposed by the Banking Bureau were NT$39.72 million, down 52.09 percent from a year earlier. The largest fine was NT$12 million imposed on Taichung Commercial Bank Co (台中商銀), with fines of NT$8 million respectively imposed on Shin Kong Commercial Bank (新光銀行) and Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行).
The Insurance Bureau imposed total fines of NT$36 million during the eight-month period, down 27.13 percent year-on-year. The largest fine was NT$9 million imposed on the Taiwan branch of Cardif Assurance Vie (法國巴黎人壽), followed by a NT$6 million fine imposed on the Taiwan branch of Cardif Assurance Risques Divers (法國巴黎產物保險).
Both are subsidiaries of the same France-based international insurance company.
During the same period, the Securities and Futures Bureau fined several securities and futures firms, including Time Securities Investment Consulting Co (時間投顧) and Cathay Securities Investment Trust Co (國泰投信), for a total of NT$53.3 million, up 0.34 percent year-on-year.
The commission’s budget documents show that it has set target penalties of NT$263.37 billion for next year, down about 4.12 percent from this year’s target and the lowest in the past four years.
The commission said that it views these fines as a way to help firms correct their deficiencies, not as a means of generating income.
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