China Merchants Bank may set up more overseas branches

HAILAER, Inner Mongolia: China Merchants Bank (CMB) will use part of the money to be raised in a share issuing plan at Shanghai and Hong Kong bourses to set up overseas branches and not for overseas merger and acquisition activities, Ma Weihua, president, CMB told China Daily on Friday.

The bank, the country's sixth largest and the flagship of medium-sized commercial lenders, said in a statement on Friday that it expect to raise 15-18 billion yuan via a rights issue of Hong Kong-listed H shares and Shanghai-listed A shares to boost its capital adequacy ratio.

The fund to be raised will be used to open new branches, training employees and improve CMB's IT system, according to Ma, who made the remarks on the annul medium-sized commercial bank summit held in Hailaer, Inner Mongolia autonomous region.