Dutch financial services group ING Group NV aims to open 50 new insurance branches in China in the next three years as part of an aggressive expansion plan in the country, an executive said.
Jacques Kemp, chief executive of Insurance Asia Pacific for ING, told Reuters that he hoped mid-sized lender Bank of Beijing, in which ING holds a 16.07 percent stake, could soon buy into one of ING's two Chinese insurance joint ventures.
ING would look to Bank of Beijing for capital support for the expansion of its network of branches, which ING hopes it will eventually be able to consolidate into one unit, Kemp said in an interview.
The two JVs currently have about 20 branches and sub-branches, he said.
"We hope with them to have a very supportive party to keep investing and growing rapidly, as the local Chinese competitors have been doing, so that we are able to catch up with them," Kemp said on the sidelines of the Boao Forum for Asia, held over the weekend on the southern Chinese island of Hainan.
He did not say in which of ING's two JVs Bank of Beijing might initially buy a stake. ING holds a 50 percent stake in two life assurance ventures; China Pacific Insurance holds the other half of Pacific-Antai Life Insurance Co in Shanghai, while Beijing Capital Group owns half of ING Capital Life Insurance Co, based in the northern city of Dalian.
Kemp added that ING was interested in raising its stake in Bank of Beijing back up to its original 19.9 percent, which was later diluted when the Beijing bank listed in Shanghai late last year, if regulations allowed and the bank listed in Hong Kong. "Yes, because we are very happy, we have a very close partnership," he said. Bank of Beijing has said it plans to list in Hong Kong but has not given a date.
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