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There are truly a lot of banks in Taiwan.

• imrehg 12y ago
  The funny thing is that (as far as I know) there can never be any more than this. Taiwan stopped giving out banking licenses, so you can only open up a branch here if you buy someone else's. That happened, ABN Amro exited and ANZ bought their stuff a few years back. Other banks that couldn't get in, got some of their stuff locked up or expelled, because they came over from e.g. HK and were doing banking services for some people. Taiwanese financial regulations are a big hot mess, and if anything it seems to be regressing. E.g. used to be you can connect your account at any bank to Paypal (ebay / online selling anyone?), now there's only one single bank that you can use, and they call it "innovation" and "competitive industry" (exact words the clerk told me, couldn't help laughing into his face). There's a lot to improve and nobody who can put the pressure on them to actually do that...
  • humanarity 12y ago
    That is funny about the licenses. I guess 20+ banks was finally enough. The funniest name to me is Yuanta -- because it looks like "big money." I've heard it said the reason for relatively more banks is because ethnically Chinese people save more than Westerners, who prefer to spend more, thus requiring fewer banks. You may be interested to know that HK stopped giving out street vendor (aka dai pai dong) licenses, with the only way to get one being marriage to a licensee, leading to dwindling numbers of street vendors -- another thing Taiwan doesn't seem to be short on!