Steady Improvement in Quality and Benefits of Operations, Continuous Deepening of Structural Transformation—Bank of Communications 2025 Performance Outlook

On March 27, Bank of Communications released its 2025 annual performance. Judging from core indicators, this state-owned large commercial bank headquartered in Shanghai is showing a development trend of “steady expansion in scale, improving profitability, and continuous optimization of its structure.”

By the end of 2025, the Group’s total assets exceeded 15.5 trillion yuan, up 4.35% year over year; net profit attributable to shareholders of the parent company was 155k yuan, up 2.18%; and operating revenue was 95.62B yuan, up 2.02%. Overall operations demonstrated strong resilience.

From operational practice, Bank of Communications’ transformation process can be summarized in three dimensions: focusing on “what is real,” making progress “with what is new,” and acting “with what is best.” This is not only a logic of business evolution in a particular stage, but also reflects the common choices made by banks in a new cycle.

Focusing on “what is real”: continuing to optimize the credit structure

The core of banking lies in the function of allocating funds. The essence of “focusing on what is real” is to return to the origin of providing financial services to the real economy.

The “Five Essays on Major Articles” is undoubtedly an important window for observing how banks serve the real economy. Based on the data disclosed by Bank of Communications, its credit structure is continuing to tilt toward key areas.

By the end of 2025, the balance of onshore renminbi loans reached 8.87 trillion yuan, up 7.88%. Among them, the loan growth rates for manufacturing and private enterprises were both higher than the overall loan level, indicating that credit resources are further concentrating on key areas of the real economy.

At the regional level, loans in the three key regions—Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, the Yangtze River Delta, and the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area—accounted for about 54% of the total, up 6.59% year over year, reflecting continued support for major national strategies in key regions.

In specific sectors, technology finance became one of the highlights of growth. By building a comprehensive service system covering “equity, bonds, loans, leasing, and trusteeship,” Bank of Communications has been continuously strengthening support for technology enterprises across their full life cycle. By year-end, the balance of technology loans exceeded 1.58 trillion yuan, up 10.73%. Of that, the growth rates of loans to “specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovative” enterprises and to technology-based small and medium-sized enterprises reached 21.02% and 36.29%, respectively.

In the area of green finance, the balance of onshore green loans reached 265.07B yuan, up 14.16%. The bank also broadened financing channels through green bonds, transition finance, and other approaches. The rollout of innovative businesses, including CCER pledged financing and sustainability-linked loans, also reflects Bank of Communications’ business exploration under its “dual carbon” goals.

Inclusive finance continued its high-growth momentum. Small and micro loans grew 20.76% year over year, while agricultural-related loans grew 11.99%. With policy guidance and support from digital tools, small and micro business gradually shifted from “scale expansion” to “efficiency improvement.”

In pension finance, it has comprehensively promoted and improved the pension finance service system. By the end of 2025, the balance of loans to the pension industry across the bank grew 49.12% compared with the end of the previous year; and the scale of social security cards and personal pension business increased significantly.

In digital finance, it strengthened the top-level design, deepened innovative applications of digital technologies and data elements, focused on strategic priority areas, innovated digital product services, and saw core-industry loans in the digital economy grow 14.46%.

In this process, “where the money goes” became a key question. Through optimizing credit deployment and product systems, Bank of Communications helps ensure that financial resources are embedded more effectively into the key links of real-economy operations, thereby achieving continuous optimization of its own asset structure while supporting economic growth.

Making progress “with what is new”: building distinctive business strengths

If “focusing on what is real” addresses the direction of resource allocation, then “making progress with what is new” answers how banks build differentiated competitive strengths.

As the only state-owned major bank headquartered in Shanghai, Bank of Communications has continued to strengthen its “home-field advantage,” increasing its support for the construction of Shanghai’s “five centers.” In 2025, the growth rate of renminbi loans in Shanghai exceeded 16%, clearly higher than the overall level. In three leading industries—integrated circuits, biopharmaceuticals, and artificial intelligence—cumulative loan disbursements exceeded 40 billion yuan, achieving deep coverage of key industrial chains.

At the same time, Bank of Communications has continued to build distinctive businesses such as wealth management and cross-border finance, as well as trade finance.

In retail business, through an end-to-end system of “research and investment + product selection + allocation + companionship,” it enhances wealth management capabilities. By the end of 2025, the retail AUM size was close to 6 trillion yuan, up 8.91%; and the balances of agency-sold personal public funds and personal wealth management products reached 230 billion yuan and 1.0225 trillion yuan, respectively.

In cross-border and trade finance, it continues to deepen on the basis of traditional strengths. In 2025, international settlement volume grew 14.55% year over year, and cross-border business revenue grew 7.61%. Among them, platforms such as “BoCom Shipping Trade Link” achieve integrated cross-border settlement, financing, and hedging services, improving service efficiency for foreign trade enterprises. The scale of renminbi cross-border settlement and offshore financing also increased significantly, reflecting its deepening participation in the process of renminbi internationalization.

In terms of digital transformation, this has become an important strategic lever for Bank of Communications in recent years. From infrastructure to business applications, the transformation has entered a deeper stage.

On one hand, the core system completed its transformation to a distributed architecture and obtained the highest-level certification of a financial industry digital transformation capability assessment model (FDMM); on the other hand, applications of AI and data elements in business have continued to expand, covering multiple scenarios including marketing, risk control, and operations. In 2025, Bank of Communications’ investment in financial technology was 88.7k yuan, up 6.81%, accounting for 5.78% of operating revenue. The Group’s financial technology personnel numbered 9,782, up 8.20% from the end of the previous year.

From industry trends, digitalization has evolved from an “efficiency tool” into one of banks’ core competitive strengths. Continued increases in technology investment and organizational capabilities help Bank of Communications build long-term advantages in future competition.

It can be seen that the core of “making progress with what is new” is not only an upgrade at the level of technology application, but also a systematic reshaping of organizational capabilities, business models, and service systems, using technology as the lever.

Acting “with what is best”: continuously consolidating the operating foundation

Risk management capability is the bottom line for sound and steady banking operations.

In recent years, Bank of Communications has continued to improve its comprehensive risk management system, strengthen forward-looking risk controls, move the risk management gate further upstream, and steadily improve overall asset quality.

By the end of 2025, the non-performing loan ratio fell to 1.28%, down 0.03 percentage points from the end of the previous year; the coverage ratio of provisions increased to 208.38%. In the context that real estate risks have been gradually cleared and some industries are still in an adjustment cycle, risk indicators remained stable and improved.

Overall, “acting with what is best” not only means optimizing the profitability structure, but also achieving a dynamic balance between controllable risk and improved returns in a complex environment.

From market feedback, many securities firms hold a positive view of Bank of Communications’ 2025 performance and generally give ratings of “overweight” or “outperform the industry.” In its research report, Shenwan Hongyuan Securities noted that its annual report delivered excellent performance characterized by “profit improvement and stable net interest margin support.” At the same time, its dividend yield ranked among the top among large banks, and it maintained an “overweight” rating.

At the intersection between the closing of the 14th Five-Year Plan and the start of the 15th Five-Year Plan, Bank of Communications’ transformation and development is not a breakthrough in a single area, but a transformation path with inherent logic: calibrating direction with “what is real,” building capabilities with “what is new,” and delivering results with “what is best.”

As the 15th Five-Year Plan cycle begins, Bank of Communications’ future development path will likely continue to focus on strengthening high-quality financial supply, enhancing value-creation capabilities, and improving its risk management system. With further deepening of digital transformation and continued efforts in key business areas, its innovative practices to further consolidate distinctive advantages and achieve improvements in development quality and efficiency in the next cycle are also worth ongoing attention.

Release

Editor: Zhu Jiaqi

Proofreader: Zhang Liyuan

Reviewed by: Zhang Xiaoya