ICBC targets South Korean’s Kwangju Bank takeover

The Chinese lender will become the first Chinese company to bid for a South Korean financial firm if it joins the race.

The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China is considering taking over South Korea's Kwangju Bank, a report said Thursday, as the world's largest bank by market value moves to expand overseas.

The newspaper Dong-A Ilbo cited financial industry sources as saying ICBC had expressed an intention to bid for the regional bank based in the southwestern city of Kwangju.

Kwangju Bank has assets of 17.9 trillion won (15.7 billion dollars) and is a subsidiary of Woori Financial Holdings, South Korea's largest financial holding company by assets.

The government plans to shed its 57 percent stake in Woori Finance, which was created in 2001 after Seoul pumped tens of billions of bailout dollars into several banks struggling in the wake of the 1997-98 East Asian financial crisis.

A spokeswoman for the Public Fund Oversight Committee, a state agency overseeing the sale, said organisers had sent letters outlining the deal to two or three Chinese lenders including ICBC.

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