Radio Taiwan International
Date: 2017-11-27

Taiwan’s finance ministry is projecting that a group of nine public banks could lose some NT$14.8 billion (nearly half a billion US dollars) over a scandal involving the nation’s largest private shipbuilder — Ching Fu Shipbuilding.

The Ministry of Finance and the Financial Supervisory Commission made the projection in a report which they delivered to the legislature’s finance committee on Monday.

The scandal involves a defense ministry contract to build six minesweepers. The fraud allegedly occurred when Ching Fu obtained a NT$20.5 billion loan from nine domestic lenders led by First Commercial Bank. The banks went on to lend Ching Fu NT$15.4 billion, or about three-quarters of the total. But then they halted the loans after the Kaohsiung District Prosecutors’ Office launched an investigation in August into Ching Fu’s activities. First Commercial Bank then filed a criminal lawsuit against Ching Fu Shipbuilding in October for breach of contract.    [FULL  STORY]