Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp (OCBC) halted trading of its shares on Friday afternoon, ahead of an expected agreement to buy Hong Kong’s Wing Hang Bank:

• The deal could be worth as much as S$6.7 billion.
• Bloomberg News reported that OCBC had obtained preliminary approval from the Hong Kong Monetary Authority to buy Wing Hang
• If an agreement is reached, OCBC will have to make a takeover offer for the remaining shares in Wing Hang.
• OCBC shares had fallen around 1.1 per cent on Friday afternoon before trading was halted.
• Wing Hang would give OCBC a network of about 70 branches spanning Hong Kong, Macau and mainland China.

As mentioned previously, the share price is likely to go down in the near term because OCBC is buying Wing Hang at a premium to its book value. But I view it positively in the long-term since OCBC would gain a ......