Reform from within, growth from outside: Huaxia Bank's year of transformative change

In the annual reports of multiple publicly listed banks, 2025 has been regarded as an extraordinary year. With shifts in the external environment, margin compression, and insufficient effective credit demand—this is a year of steady progress under industry pressure. Headquartered in Beijing, Huaxia Bank (600015.SH) delivered an impressive set of results.

As of the end of 2025, Huaxia Bank’s total assets reached RMB 4.74T, up 8.3%. Of this, deposits totaled RMB 2.38T, up 10.7%; loans totaled RMB 2.57T, up 8.5%. The increases in both deposits and loans, as well as their growth rates, all hit new highs in the past five years. Compared with the end of the previous year, the proportion of technology finance loans increased by 2.93 percentage points, while the proportion of green finance loans increased by 2.60 percentage points.

Meanwhile, asset quality improved steadily: Huaxia Bank’s non-performing loan ratio in 2025 was 1.55%, down 0.05 percentage points, achieving a continued decline for five consecutive years.

In addition, profitability remained steady. Operating income was RMB 91.91B, and net profit attributable to shareholders of the listed company was RMB 27.2 billion.

As stated by Huaxia Bank Chairman Yang Shujian and President Qu Gang in their annual report remarks: “Looking back at 2025, every achievement was hard-won and highly valuable; every step forward leaves footprints that embody steadfastness and dedication.”

The efforts throughout the past year have traced Huaxia Bank’s profound transformation—from within to without, and from scale to quality and efficiency.

Turn the Blade Inward: Activate a New Engine for Self-Reform

Set the clock back to early 2025. Huaxia Bank welcomed a new executive leader, and a “self-reform” initiative began.

“Step out of the comfort zone and open up a new journey” became the ideological starting point for Huaxia Bank’s qualitative transformation.

In 2025, Huaxia Bank carried out its “Ten Major Actions” to enhance business and development. This systematic reform initiative directly addressed pain points in business and development. From clarifying its business strategy to improving internal management, from optimizing and adjusting the organizational structure to significantly cutting various expenses, Huaxia Bank comprehensively reshaped itself, invigorating the fighting spirit of management and staff across the bank, charting a new course for steady and long-term development.

Huaxia Bank streamlined five first-level departments, and optimized internal arrangements across 26 head-office departments. This drove institutional streamlining, clear delineation of powers and responsibilities, and smoother mechanisms, providing more efficient and flexible management support for business development and fully releasing organizational effectiveness.

The evaluation system was also rebuilt. Huaxia Bank established an integrated evaluation mechanism of “evaluation–promotion–assessment–improvement,” using “three core indicators”—benefit, scale, and quality—and “five key targets,” such as customer-related and distinctive business objectives, with the evaluation scope covering institutions at all levels.

Huaxia Bank also strengthened cost and expense control across the board. The annual report shows that business and management fees were RMB 28.13B, down RMB 821M year over year, a decrease of 2.84%.

In this “turn-the-blade-inward” reform, Huaxia Bank has undergone a whole new transformation.

The most direct indicator is the quarter-by-quarter improvement in profitability. Data show that the decline in Huaxia Bank’s operating income narrowed by 3.40 percentage points compared with the first three quarters, while the decline in net profit attributable to shareholders of the listed company narrowed by 1.14 percentage points compared with the first three quarters.

When “downsizing” of organizations and “muscle gain” in efficiency occur in tandem, and when assessments shift from a scale-oriented approach to value creation, a bank’s operating resilience is redefined.

The results of the reform gave Huaxia Bank even more confidence in dividends. In 2025, the dividend payout ratio reached 25.94%, up 0.9 percentage points from the previous year. Notably, over the past three years, the bank’s total dividend amount has increased year by year, and the payout ratio has risen year by year. In 2024 and 2025, Huaxia Bank also implemented interim dividend policies.

“Future cash dividend policy will take into account regulatory requirements, shareholders’ investment returns, and the company’s needs for sustainable development. The Company will continue to enhance its profitability and maintain a reasonable dividend payout ratio.” At Huaxia Bank’s performance briefing, management reiterated this position.

Breakthrough and Defeat Headwinds: Deep Dive into the ‘Dual-Core Characteristics’ of Serving the Real Economy

The new engine created by internal reform provides a solid foundation for Huaxia Bank to better serve the real economy.

Only when the key points are grasped and breakthroughs are made can the overall leap be triggered. While doing a good job on the “Five Major Articles of Financial Services,” Huaxia Bank has devoted itself to building two business operating characteristics: technology finance and green finance.

Compared with the end of the previous year, in 2025 Huaxia Bank’s technology finance loan share increased by 2.93 percentage points, and its green finance loan share increased by 2.60 percentage points. Meanwhile, the outstanding balances of technology finance and green finance loans increased by 53.74% and 30.99% year over year, respectively—growth rates higher than the growth rate of the bank’s total loan balance by 45.02 and 22.27 percentage points.

It is reported that over the past year, Huaxia Bank accelerated the construction of its technology finance organizational system. Five branches—Beijing, Nanjing, Hangzhou, Shenzhen, and Wuhan—established technology finance centers. Across the bank, it set up 7 technology finance branches and 32 technology-feature branches, initially building a professional service system covering the three-tier structure of headquarters, branches, and sub-branches.

Based on the continuous improvement of its service system, Huaxia Bank’s empowerment of technology-based enterprises has become more efficient and precise. For example, it established a “loan-investment link” mechanism and innovatively launched distinctive products such as R&D loans, loan-investment linkage loans, and option-based loans, providing technology companies with comprehensive financial services throughout their entire life cycle. It also deepened cooperation with various types of institutions to build an all-around, multi-level technology finance ecosystem and support the conversion and implementation of technological achievements. In addition, it rolled out the bank’s first investments in science and technology corporate bonds in the interbank market.

In the green finance sector, Huaxia Bank focuses on building a “beautiful China,” and has formed an end-to-end green finance service system covering “loans + investments + underwriting + leasing + wealth management.” It cooperates with the Asian Development Bank to carry out key projects such as “Promoting Green and Low-Carbon Development of Industrial Parks.”

Under the guidance of Huaxia Bank’s “dual-core characteristics,” achievements in other areas are also noteworthy. The vision stated in the annual report—“Five Major Articles, Each Is Excellent”—is gradually becoming reality.

In inclusive finance, the outstanding balance of inclusive loans to small and micro enterprises was RMB 193.6 billion, up 6%, and it has met regulatory plans for eight consecutive years. In pension finance, the number of personal pension accounts was 776k, up 30.8%; financing for the pension industry was RMB 58.6 billion, up 32.8%. In digital finance, loans to the core industries of the digital economy were RMB 97.1 billion, up 29.9%.

It is worth noting that Huaxia Bank has fully leveraged its “Beijing home-ground” advantage, with its market share continuing to rise. Data show that in 2025 the bank cumulatively provided various investment and financing services to the Beijing region of over RMB 500 billion, up 14.9%, with deposit and loan growth rates of 17% and 13%, respectively.

Through the Cycle: A New Framework for Diversified Development

As the external environment changes even more rapidly and challenges increase day by day, whether a bank can get through the cycle depends on whether it has enough sources of diversified momentum.

Looking back at the past year, Huaxia Bank has noticeably accelerated its steps toward building a coordinated development pattern across multiple fields.

Not only did its corporate clients increase by 6.71% compared with the end of the previous year, its corporate deposits increased by 11.43%, and its corporate loans (excluding discounting) increased by 13.88%. Personal deposits also rose by 9.01% compared with the end of the previous year; personal consumption loan balances increased by 0.40%; and the cumulative number of credit cards issued increased by 3.20% compared with the end of the previous year.

At the same time, the bank’s presence in financial markets kept increasing. In 2025, the cumulative trading volume of onshore and offshore currency funds was RMB 86.9 trillion, derivatives trading volume was RMB 10.3 trillion, and bill trading volume was RMB 2 trillion. The bank also successfully launched its first QDII custody business. Its asset custody scale exceeded RMB 4 trillion, up 18.9%.

In addition, enhanced reach capabilities bear witness to iterative upgrades in digital transformation. In 2025, Huaxia Bank had 31.31 million customers who signed up for its mobile banking, with 6.26 million monthly active users (MAUs).

Besides that, its subsidiaries performed exceptionally well.

Data show that Huaxia Financial Leasing’s total assets exceeded RMB 200 billion, net profit exceeded RMB 3 billion, and its ROE ranked first among 66 peers; Huaxia Wealth Management’s product management scale reached RMB 1.2 trillion, up 45.8%. Its growth rate has been among the industry leaders for three consecutive years. It had 172 partner distribution channels, ranking in the top three among peers. The proportion of distribution at third-party channels exceeded 60%, moving it to first place among peers.

2025 is both the concluding year of Huaxia Bank’s “14th Five-Year Plan” and a key leap toward high-quality development. This year, Huaxia Bank used the courage to turn the blade inward to achieve a qualitative transformation. By deepening the “dual-core characteristics” to open up space and strengthening resilience through the construction of a diversified framework, it has built a more robust foundation.

“Cloud road sets forth, and a bright future is within reach.” As stated in the annual report remarks, standing on the new starting point of the “15th Five-Year Plan,” Huaxia Bank will continue to adhere to “returning business to its fundamentals, returning management to its essence, and returning positioning to its true nature,” and write a new chapter in the practice of modernized finance in China.