The Analysis of Financial Holding Companies and Unified Financial Supervision in Taiwan

The thesis focuses mainly on the issues that how financial regulation and supervision adjust their function with the trend of financial liberalization and emergence of financial conglomerates. This study first investigates the financial reform and unified or diversified financial supervision of following 4 industrialized countries---U.K., Canada, Japan, and U.S. After discussing these issues we then analyze the financial reform in Taiwan in recent years, including the emergence of financial holding companies, the formation of Financial Supervisory Commission, and the issues they are involved in. The conclusion of this study shows that after the starting up of the FSC, it’s easier for supervisors to assess the risks of a financial holding company on a consolidated basis by means of information sharing and cooperation mechanism. It’s also found that adopting the unified or diversified supervision of financial services is not as much important. Rather, maintaining the independence of supervisory authorities, clarifying the regulatory policies and supervisory measures, adopting risk-based and functional supervisory approaches, and strengthening the sharing information and cooperation mechanism with different supervisors are the key points of successful financial supervision. In the end of the thesis, we make some suggestions concerning the financial supervision in Taiwan.