All's well that ends well. Some months ago rumours had it that the Agricultural Bank of China was bidding for the controlling stake in Wing Hang Bank. OCBC has since emerged as the winner. These days, the state-owned banks in Hong Kong embrace the freedom of assembly by encouraging their staff members to turn up at the "anti-occupy Central march". The last thing this city needs is another big PRC bank.
OCBC Bank has a branch in London at Rex Building in the City which offers mortgage loans for property investments in London. I would love to see more competition with Bank of East Asia, HSBC and Shanghai Commercial Bank, which are apparently the the only lenders which offer UK mortgage loans to their Hong Kong customers.
On 18 August, Wing Hang announced that its name would change to OCBC Wing Hang with effect from 1 October. A happy coincidence.
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