bank, as the Second Sino-Japanese War and later Japanese occupation of Hong Kong resulted in heavy losses, with many of BEA's assets seized. Even after the war, the Chinese Civil War and later United Nations embargo on China negatively affected Hong Kong's economy, and as a result, BEA. In 1965, Hong Kong experienced a city-wide banking crisis which saw other local Hong Kong banks suffer bank runs and hostile takeovers, such as Hang Seng Bank. BEA, however, was undisturbed, but became much more conservative thereafter. In 1984, after the Sino-British Joint Declaration, BEA refused to follow the lead of many leading firms at the time to move their headquarters overseas, and instead decided to double-down and reaffirm their "Hong Kong roots". Traditionally more focused on internal growth rather than external acquisitions, in 1995, BEA made its first acquisition when it acquired United Chinese Bank (), with the merger being completed in 2001. BEA also acquired First Pacific Bank in 2000, and that merger was completed in 2002. 2008 to 2018 On 24 September 2008, BEA experienced a serious test in the form of the worst bank run in its history. BEA had to issue a statement to counter "malicious rumours" about its stability, as queues of customers seeking to withdraw funds formed outside some of its Hong Kong branches. It condemned the rumour mongers, declaring that it had sufficient funds to meet customers' requests, and noting that its capital adequacy ratio was above the industry average, at 14.6 percent. A statement by Joseph Yam, the then chief executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, dismissed the rumour and strongly supported the bank, adding that funds would be made available to the bank if required but that no request had been made. Earlier in the week, the bank had been forced to restate its previous half-year's earnings downwards by nearly 12 percent after it was revealed that one of its staff had conducted unauthorised trades and then buried the losses. In October 2015, BEA entered into agreement with Sinopac Securities to sell BEA Wealth Management Services (Taiwan) Limited and Tung Shing Holdings Company Limited. BEA chairman and CEO David Li said that the disposals would allow BEA to rationalise its securities business in Greater China region. There was no disclosure of the transaction amount involved in this sales. As the banking sector and BEA continued to face challenges, BEA launched a