State-owned Taiwan Cooperative Bank (合作金庫) is to merge with Chinfon Commercial Bank (慶豐銀行) in a NT$1.8 trillion deal, which will create Taiwan's second-largest financial institution, Premier Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) announced yesterday.
The move is part of the government's drive to combine the nation's roughly 400 local lenders into fewer, larger groups.
Sean Chen (
According to Chang, Taiwan Cooperative Bank has already signed a memorandum on the merger with Chinfon Bank.
The deal represents the first bank merger initiated by the DPP administration.
Last year the former KMT administration had envisioned merging the Bank of Taiwan (
But worries over job losses as a result of the tie-up sunk the plan. Market watchers, on the other hand, say the three-way merger was scrapped because the three banks are too similar in their businesses.
That's not the case with Chinfon and Taiwan Cooperative, officials say. "Chinfon Bank is good at consumer banking, while Taiwan Cooperative Bank is good at corporate banking; they could complement each other," Chen said.
Minister of Finance Yen Ching-chang (
The government is pressing for Taiwan's 53 local banks and 314 credit cooperatives and farmers' and fishermen's associations to combine into fewer groups that are better able to cope with rising bad loans and increased competition from foreign rivals.
The government's efforts come as bad loans are rising: 8.4 percent of credits are bad or may go delinquent, according to official figures, though analysts say the true level could be twice that.
A 40 percent slump in the stock market has hurt the value of banks' stock holdings and eroded the value of the stocks many borrowers hold as collateral for their loans.
Too much competition is also leaving banks strapped for profitable lending opportunities from creditworthy customers.
"Over-banking is a problem in Taiwan's banking sector, because the quality of loans will deteriorate as lenders compete fiercely for borrowers," said central bank Governor Perng Fai-nan (
The central bank on Thursday reduced its forecast for economic growth next year to 5.8 percent from 6 percent.
Taiwan Cooperative's takeover of Chinfon would create a lender with nearly NT$1.8 trillion (US$54 billion) of combined assets, the second biggest in Taiwan. The combined group would have NT$1.45 trillion in deposits, and NT$1.17 trillion of loans.
Taiwanese actress Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛) has died of pneumonia at the age of 48 while on a trip to Japan, where she contracted influenza during the Lunar New Year holiday, her sister confirmed today through an agent. "Our whole family came to Japan for a trip, and my dearest and most kindhearted sister Barbie Hsu died of influenza-induced pneumonia and unfortunately left us," Hsu's sister and talk show hostess Dee Hsu (徐熙娣) said. "I was grateful to be her sister in this life and that we got to care for and spend time with each other. I will always be grateful to
REMINDER: Of the 6.78 million doses of flu vaccine Taiwan purchased for this flu season, about 200,000 are still available, an official said, following Big S’ death As news broke of the death of Taiwanese actress and singer Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛), also known as Big S (大S), from severe flu complications, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and doctors yesterday urged people at high risk to get vaccinated and be alert to signs of severe illness. Hsu’s family yesterday confirmed that the actress died on a family holiday in Japan due to pneumonia during the Lunar New Year holiday. CDC Deputy Director-General Tseng Shu-hui (曾淑慧) told an impromptu news conference that hospital visits for flu-like illnesses from Jan. 19 to Jan. 25 reached 162,352 — the highest
COMBINING FORCES: The 66th Marine Brigade would support the 202nd Military Police Command in its defense of Taipei against ‘decapitation strikes,’ a source said The Marine Corps has deployed more than 100 soldiers and officers of the 66th Marine Brigade to Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) as part of an effort to bolster defenses around the capital, a source with knowledge of the matter said yesterday. Two weeks ago, a military source said that the Ministry of National Defense ordered the Marine Corps to increase soldier deployments in the Taipei area. The 66th Marine Brigade has been tasked with protecting key areas in Taipei, with the 202nd Military Police Command also continuing to defend the capital. That came after a 2017 decision by the ministry to station
PETITIONS: A Democratic Progressive Party official quoted President William Lai as saying that civil society groups are organizing the recall drives at the grassroots level Some civil society groups yesterday announced that they have collected enough signatures to pass the first-stage threshold to initiate a recall vote against Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators in 18 constituencies nationwide, saying that they would submit the signatures to the Central Election Commission (CEC) today. They also said that they expected to pass the threshold in eight more constituencies in the coming days, meaning the number of KMT legislators facing a recall vote could reach 26. The groups set up stations to collect signatures at local marketplaces and busy commercial districts. The legislators their petition drives target include Fu
RSS