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AFTER infrastructure, agriculture and telecommunications, China
wants to establish a presence in the Philippine banking industry.
China’s biggest commercial bank wants to
expand into the Philippines through the acquisition of local lenders
or joint ventures with them, the Department of Finance (DOF) said.
Finance Undersecretary Gil Beltran said the
Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) already has a list of
Philippine banks it is eyeing, and wants to start as soon as
possible.
“They were in the country to look for
partners, banks that are open for joint ventures, or acquisition,”
Beltran told reporters.
He said ICBC representatives had a meeting with
the official from the finance department and the Bangko Sentral ng
Pilipinas last week.
“They want to know the tax system and
requirement for investors. They see the potential of the country.
They also realized that we’re doing a lot of improvements,” the
finance official said.
ICBC representatives who met with Philippine
officials were Gao Xiangyang, ICBC global merger and acquisition
team head and Wang Wendin, ICBC deputy general manager.
Founded in 1984, ICBC had a market value of
$338.93 billion last year, making it the largest bank by market
value among listed lenders. Since the establishment of a financial
leasing unit last year, ICBC’s businesses have extended to
investment banking and leasing.
The Chinese lender had taken stakes in the
largest banks in Macau and Africa, and ventured into Russia,
Indonesia and other emerging markets. It has 112 overseas
institutions and built up a global service network covering the main
international financial centers and China’s major trading and
exchanging areas.
The bank maintains 381,713 staff worldwide,
providing various financial products and services for 170 million
individual customers and 2.72 million corporate clients.
As the biggest commercial bank in China, ICBC
provides diversified, professional financial services to corporate
and personal customers in the mainland.
-- Chino S. Leyco
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