Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC, ICBC has actively boosted growth of its overseas business to support Chinese enterprises to accelerate go global and “Belt and Road” initiative. As at the end of the first half this year, the Bank’s global service network extended to 42 countries and territories worldwide and indirectly covered 20 African countries through equity participation in Standard Bank Group. Its foreign correspondent banks were distributed in over 95% countries and territories that have investment and trade ties with China. The assets and profits of ICBC overseas institutions realized a nearly twofold growth over the past five years. Total assets reached USD 306.5 billion, accounting for 8.8% of the Group’s total assets, and after-provision profit grew to USD 3,247 million. The number of overseas employees reached nearly 15,000, over 90% of which are local residents. Taking ICBC overseas institutions as an independent bank, it would rank 61st in the global banking industry by total assets. In the past five years, compound annual growth rate of their assets and profits reached 24.6% and 23.57% respectively and non-performing asset ratio stayed low among major global peers. It played an important role in driving profitability, diversifying operational risk and enhancing comprehensive competitiveness of the Group.

An official with ICBC said that the rapid and healthy development of the Bank’s overseas business was primarily attributed to the enormous demand for financial service of Chinese enterprises during “go global” and the “Belt and Road” initiative. Currently, ICBC has supported 212 projects along the Belt and Road, agreed to provide USD 67.4 billion loans and reserved a large number of projects. With focus on key industrial projects, the Bank actively supported railway construction enterprises to participate in bidding for high-speed railway and rail transit projects in countries along the Belt and Road, supported energy enterprises for resources cooperation in Central Asia, Middle East and East Africa, supported power enterprises to build China-Pakistan Economic Corridor and nuclear power projects and supported telecommunication enterprises on global presence. All of these efforts directly drove the business development of overseas institutions. Meanwhile, to meet global investment and financing demand of enterprises going global, the Bank provided increasingly enriched cross-border investment and financing services, including standby syndicated loan, acquisition financing, lease financing and bond issuance in global market. In recent years, the size of syndications organized by ICBC ranked first as leading manager and book-runner in the Asia-Pacific region. The number of M&A transactions led by ICBC ranked first in the region for three consecutive years.

In supporting enterprises going global and the “Belt and Road” initiative, by leveraging its regional and license advantage, ICBC has accelerated the extension of domestic major product lines overseas, which enhanced its global service ability. Currently, the Bank’s global cash management business has covered over 5,000 enterprises in 70 countries and territories. Financial market business realized 24-hour non-stop transaction for foreign currency debentures, foreign exchange trading, account-based precious metal and commodity, with over 30 currencies available for FX settlement. Annual transaction value of foreign exchange exceeded USD 620 billion. Asset custody service had the largest size in China and the size of QDII asset custody reached RMB 135.5 billion, taking nearly 30% market share. Clearing service supported a wide range of currencies and US dollar, Euro and Japanese yen clearing centers were set up in New York, Frankfurt and Tokyo. To satisfy increasingly strong demand of enterprises going global in cross-border Renminbi business, ICBC launched ICBC Cross-border Pass, which covered the whole cross-border RMB product system including settlement financing, cross-border guarantee, currency risk hedging and offshore RMB bond underwriting and issuance. The efforts were intended to meet the enterprises’ all-round settlement and investment/financing demand in foreign trade, investment and operation. Meanwhile, ICBC became qualified as RMB clearing bank in Singapore, Luxembourg, Qatar, Canada, Thailand, Argentina and Russia, becoming the first commercial bank to set up a global RMB clearing network across Asia, Europe and America. Throughout last year, ICBC’s domestic and overseas institutions posted RMB 3.89 trillion cross-border RMB business, among which cross-border RMB settlement of overseas institutions approached RMB 2 trillion.

More importantly, ICBC overseas institutions have continued to drive the strategy of localized and featured development, maintaining strong momentum on expanding customer base, diversifying business, enlarging asset size and optimizing asset structure. Consequently, localized development and customer service ability were significantly improved, providing solid foundation for healthy and sustainable development. In the Asia-Pacific region, ICBC (Asia) Limited and ICBC Hong Kong Branch had a total asset of over HKD 1 trillion, ranking 5th among comparable peers in the Hong Kong market, and had nearly 60 outlets and 3,000 employees. In the past five years, they  paid nearly HKD 7.2 billion tax, helping consolidate the fiscal and financial foundation of Hong Kong, strengthen Hong Kong’s position as financial center and enhance harmonious and stable social development. ICBC International Holdings Limited has completed over 100 corporate IPO financing projects since established, raising nearly USD 130 billion in total, with its underwritten IPO size ranking the first among Chinese licensed investment banks in Hong Kong. ICBC (Macau) Limited established a service network across Macau and was named the Best Bank in Macau by The Banker for seven consecutive years. In Europe, by adhering to localized operation and featured development European institutions of ICBC realized steady asset growth and operational benefit improvement. Their customers covered the majority of local Global 500 and industrial leading enterprises. ICBC (Europe) S.A. constantly explored innovative business development modes and gradually set up four featured product lines, i.e., investment banking, personal banking & asset management, global cash management and RMB business. It was the first to become qualified or licensed for RQFII, Chinese interbank bond market investment and European investment fund. Among overseas institutions of Chinese commercial banks, it was the first to win the prize Best Bank in Luxembourg by Euromoney. In Americas, ICBC (USA) NA was licensed for commercial banking wholesale, retail and securities trading business. Its outlets were distributed across the US East Coast and West Coast, demonstrating strong ability in comprehensive financial services.