Malaysia's CIMB Group, the country's second-largest lender by assets, may be able to revive its attempted entry into Asia's fastest-growing banking market by targeting Philippine National Bank (PNB).
CIMB scrapped a takeover of Manila-based Bank of Commerce in June after disagreeing on terms with the sellers. With a market value of US$18 billion, CIMB said last month it was still seeking assets in the Philippines, where bank profits grew faster in the past five years than anywhere else in Asia.
PNB, the fourth-largest bank in the Philippines based on its US$2 billion market value, is the most likely target after its own merger talks with a local rival failed last year.
Charles Ang, an analyst at COL Financial Group in Pasig City, the Philippines, said the country's banking industry "is in its infancy, so the potential is quite big".
From its 1924 roots as a financier to businesses on the island of Borneo, CIMB has completed 23 takeovers worth a combined US$4.3 billion in the past decade. The Kuala Lumpur-based bank's network, which stretches from the United States to Australia, now includes 13 Asian nations, according to its website.
In June, CIMB dropped its plans to buy 60 per cent - the maximum permitted for overseas banks under Philippine law - of Bank of Commerce from San Miguel and others for about US$280 million. "Land issues" undermined the deal, San Miguel president Ramon Ang said at the time.
CIMB chief executive Nazir Razak said three weeks ago he still wanted a business in the Philippines.
