Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Ltd has "insufficient"
assets overseas and seeks more investments abroad, President Yang
Kaisheng said, even as he denied the lender plans to buy a stake in
Standard Chartered Plc.?
"ICBC will pursue a combined strategy of acquisitions and new
projects in expanding overseas," Yang said at a finance conference
in Beijing on Saturday. "Overseas diversification is an important
way for Chinese banks to spread risks against cyclical economic
downturns."
Having raised 22 billion U.S. dollars in the world's largest
share sale a year ago, ICBC, the world's biggest bank by market
value, is expanding more aggressively than peers such as Bank of
China Ltd. ICBC's 36.7 billion rand (5.4 billion dollars) purchase
of a 20-percent stake in South Africa's Standard Bank Group Ltd is
the biggest overseas investment by a Chinese company.
"Overseas expansion is likely to continue as Chinese banks are
seeking to build up their global presence," Bill Stacey, a Hong
Kong-based analyst at Credit Suisse, told Bloomberg News yesterday,
citing ICBC's forays in Indonesia and Macau. Yang joined China
Construction Bank Corp Deputy President Luo Zhefu in denying a
newspaper report that their banks planned to acquire a stake in
Standard Chartered Plc from Temasek Holdings Pte, the Singaporean
government's investment company.
"We have no plans to buy a stake in Standard Chartered," Luo
said, while Yang said the report was "just a rumor."
The Financial Times reported that China's three biggest
banks - ICBC, Construction Bank and Bank of China - had approached
Temasek to buy a 17-percent stake.
(Shanghai Daily November 26, 2007)
