6 foreign banks eye Philippine branches —BSP

Six foreign banks have indi­cated interest to open local offices, Bangko Sentral ng Pili­pinas (BSP) Governor Amando Tetangco Jr. said.

Tetangco disclosed this in his speech during the Bank­ers’ Night Tuesday, which the central bank holds annually for stakeholders at the start of the year.

As of end-2016, the central bank’s policy-making Monetary Board (MB) approved the do­mestic operations of nine for­eign banks based in Asia.

These include Japa­nese lender Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp., South Korean Shinhan Bank, Taiwan’s Ca­thay United Bank, govern­ment-owned Industrial Bank of Korea, Yuanta Bank of Taiwan, and Singapore’s Overseas Bank Ltd (UOB).

Foreign bank operations in the domestic economy have­been fully liberalized following the approval of Republic Act (RA) 10641 or the Act Liberaliz­ing the Entry and Scope of Op­erations of Foreign Banks in the Philippines in July 2014.

Before the signing of the said law foreign financial insti­tutions can only own up to 60 percent in a domestic bank.

The law was approved as the country’s contribution to the economic integration of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which started in December 2015.

BSP Deputy Governor Nestor Espenilla Jr. said the six foreign banks have not submit­ted applications to operate in the Philippines but have indicat­ed their intention and are now in the process of completing the requirements.

He added that most of them were from the ASEAN but one was outside of the region.

He, however, declined to identify the banks, citing that the foreign financial institutions have not submitted required documents.