Insurance group Prudential has risen 7.75p to 361.75p on talk that Taiwan's Chinatrust was considering taking a stake, or even making an outright bid.
Chinatrust, the country's larget private wealth management group in terms of assets, is keen to buy an insurance company and reportedly believes share prices have fallen so far it would be cheaper to do that than set up a new business from scratch.
The Chinese-language Apple Daily today suggested Prudential, Germany's Allianz or Netherlands group Aegon would fit the bill. Chinatrust refused to comment, but reportedly it has not yet appointed advisors for any deal.
