Retail focus drives profits for Pingan Bank

Net profits of the retail business of Chinese-listed Pingan Bank surged 68.32 percent to reach about 15.6 billion yuan ($2.4 billion) in 2017, showing the bank’s growing interest in the retail section, according to its annual report released Wednesday.

The bank announced its transformation into a retail bank in 2016, mainly serving individuals and small companies.

Now retail business has become a major driving force for the bank, contributing more than 67 percent to its total net profits last year, the report showed.

The number of retail clients grew about 33 percent to reach over 69.9 million, and assets under the management of those clients increased about 36 percent to 1.08 trillion yuan, it said.

Nonperforming loans (NPLs) from the bank decreased by 0.04 percentage points in 2017, a positive result shared by most of the listed banks in China, it said.

For example, the Agricultural Bank of China saw a 0.56 percentage decline in NPLs, the best performance in the recent three years.

Besides the quality of assets, revenue and profits for some listed banks also saw growth last year, including China Merchants Bank, while others kept declining in those indexes, industrial data showed.

Revenue for Pingan Bank saw a slight decrease of 1.79 percent, but its net profits still grew by 2.61 percent.

The bank’s prominent performance in retail business can be revealed through credit cards, whose number reached more than 38.3 million in 2017, about 49 percent higher than 2016, the report said.

The loan balance for consumer finance also grew about 86 percent to reach more than 356 billion yuan, it said.

The bank established online platforms last year -- including an online bank, mobile bank, official Wechat account and website -- to make related processes more intelligent and automatic.

Its app has more than 14.8 million active users per month, according to the report.