CP Group reaches out to China
Thailand-based food and retail conglomerate Charoen Pokphand Group, which is in the process of buying a 15.57 per cent stake in China’s Ping An Insurance for $9.4 billion, says it wants to expand into rural finance in China once the deal gets approved.
According to Bloomberg, CP Group would try to convince the regulatory commission in Beijing that it can work closely with Ping An to develop its rural financing business, such as through village banks, to help the mainland modernise its agricultural sector and “close the wealth gap”.
Ping An is the second largest private insurer in China behind China Life Insurance as per market share and has operations across all of China, in Hong Kong and in Macau as well as branches or representative agents in 150 countries, providing casualty, property and life insurance, as well as financial services.
CP Group secured funding from China Development Bank for the purchase. The deal is interesting because China in the past refused to allow foreign non-financial companies to buy major stakes in its financial institutions. But Thailand’s CP Group, controlled by a Thai-Chinese family well connected in Beijing, is confident that the deal will go through.
Thailand-based food and retail conglomerate Charoen Pokphand Group, which is in the process of buying a 15.57 per cent stake in China's Ping An Insurance for $9.4 billion, says it wants to expand into rural finance in China once the deal gets approved. According to Bloomberg, CP Group would try to convince the regulatory commission in Beijing that it can work closely with Ping An to develop its rural financing business, such as through village banks, to help the mainland modernise its agricultural sector and "close the wealth gap". Ping An is the second largest private insurer in China behind...
Thailand-based food and retail conglomerate Charoen Pokphand Group, which is in the process of buying a 15.57 per cent stake in China’s Ping An Insurance for $9.4 billion, says it wants to expand into rural finance in China once the deal gets approved.
According to Bloomberg, CP Group would try to convince the regulatory commission in Beijing that it can work closely with Ping An to develop its rural financing business, such as through village banks, to help the mainland modernise its agricultural sector and “close the wealth gap”.
Ping An is the second largest private insurer in China behind China Life Insurance as per market share and has operations across all of China, in Hong Kong and in Macau as well as branches or representative agents in 150 countries, providing casualty, property and life insurance, as well as financial services.
CP Group secured funding from China Development Bank for the purchase. The deal is interesting because China in the past refused to allow foreign non-financial companies to buy major stakes in its financial institutions. But Thailand’s CP Group, controlled by a Thai-Chinese family well connected in Beijing, is confident that the deal will go through.
