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Mak to pice H&B 107/3
TALKING POINTS
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1 2 1991
کساله
26 July 1991
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TALKING POINTS issues on Fridays and records public views and reactions on current talking points collected from a small number of respondents in both urban and New Territories regions by City and New Territories Administration liaison staff over the week. As TALKING POINTS is not based upon a large representative cross-section of public opinion, indications in it should be treated with caution and should not be quoted authoritatively without first checking their reliability with the City and New Territories Administration.
SUSPENSION OF BUSINESS OF THE BANK OF CREDIT AND COMMERCE (BCC)
All respondents were sympathetic to the plight of the BCC depositors and considered their strong reaction and protests understandable. They were not sure whether liquidating the bank would be the best solution to the problem since the Government had So far released little information on the financial situation of the bank.
Some also questioned why the Government decided to liquidate in such haste, especially when there were several buyers who had indicated an interest in acquiring the bank. They suspected that the Government had not revealed all the facts to the public or wanted to absolve itself from any responsibility in this incident. Respondents felt that the Government had misled the depositors by claiming that the bank was financially viable shortly before it decided to stop the business of the bank and should therefore be required to compensate the depositors to a degree. Some respondents remarked that depositors should be given back more than 25% of their deposits. They thought that the Government had somehow victimized the small depositors in this incident and had under-estimated their strong reaction. A number of respondents also expressed disappointment over the Government's refusal to acknowledge it had mishandled the incident. They pointed out that the incident had undermined the public's confidence in the Government and cast doubt on the Banking Commission's ability to supervise and control the banking system in Hong Kong. Some felt that the officials involved should resign and that there should be an independent enquiry into the handling of the incident.
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Response was mixed towards the way the Police handled depositors' protest in Central. Some supported the action of the Police as they considered it necessary to contain the situation before it was out of control. On the other hand, some respondents thought that the image of the Police had been tarnished by their rough handling of the protestors.
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Some respondents considered the proposed introduction of a depositors' insurance scheme not practical. They thought that such a scheme would be tentamount to larger banks having to subsidise unhealthy smaller ones.
Besides, the administrative cost involved would be substantial. They urged instead tighter controls over the licensing of overseas banks and a review of the Government's supervision of banking operations in Hong Kong.
C.N.T.A. 8 (Rev.)
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