AIG sells bank and credit card business in Thailand

American International Group (AIG) has announced that it has completed the asset sale of a retail bank and credit card operations in Thailand.

The two ventures, AIG Retail Bank Public Company Limited and AIG Card (Thailand) Company Limited, were sold in Thailand to Bank of Ayudhya Public Company Limited with proceeds of around $45m in addition to the repayment of $495m of intra-group indebtedness.

AIG has sold off a number of assets recently, with this being the third in the last week. On 2 April BMO Financial Group acquired AIG Life of Canada for $263m and Munich Re Group spent $739m purchasing Hartford Steam Boiler. Chairman and chief executive officer Edward Liddy has stated that the firm is continuing its drive to dispose of assets effectively in order to repay the US Government.

Ten businesses have been sold to date, with more at the discussion stage.

Protests to damage tourism heavily

The Federation of Thai Tourism Associations (FETTA) and the Ministry of Tourism and Sports joined together Thursday to urge the ‘Red Shirt’ anti-government protesters to demonstrate peacefully but expressed concern that a prolonged with violence must eventually heavily affect Thai tourism industry.

The protest will inevitably have a negative impact on foreigners’ confidence in Thai tourism, and be reflected in cancellations and redirected travel to other destinations.
“If the protest continues and turns violent, it will negatively impact on the number of tourists entering the country, particularly on the upcoming Songkran festival and on Labor Day, when a large number of Chinese tourists are expected,” he said.

As Thai tourism has not fully recovered since the closure of the Thai two main airports late last year, Mr. Prasit said the ongoing political turmoil could possibly affect the planned summits of the members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and its international dialogue partners this weekend in Pattaya and other official meetings to be held at the end of this year might be cancelled or postponed.