Bank wealth management experiences a major boom! Last year, 15 listed banks' agency businesses earned 144.9 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 241%, with personal client AUM generally growing.

Ask AI · Behind the split in agency income, which banks’ strategies are stronger?

Cailian Press, April 3 (Editor: Wang Wei) In recent years, with the growth in wealth management demand, banks’ wealth management has entered a period of explosive development.

As of now, many listed banks have released their 2025 annual reports. Cailian Press has compiled findings showing that wealth management has become the core battleground for strategic transformation at each bank.

Data show that in 2025, among 9 banks with disclosed data, the scale of financial assets of individual customers generally achieved positive growth, and 7 banks saw growth of more than 10%;

As an important lever for wealth management, in 2025, 15 banks’ agency business earned 144.9 billion yuan, up 241% year on year, and 12 achieved positive growth.

Individual customer financial assets continue to grow, and agency income diverges clearly

From the scale of financial assets of individual customers (AUM), banks with disclosed data for 2025 generally achieved steady growth. As shown in the chart below:

Data source: Bank annual reports; compiled by Cailian Press

Overall, state-owned large banks have an absolute advantage in total AUM thanks to their extensive branch networks and large customer bases; while some joint-stock banks, leveraging more flexible product strategies and digital capabilities, have shown more prominent performance in growth rate.

Industrial and Commercial Bank of China maintains market leadership with 25.37 trillion yuan, up 11.08% from the end of 2024; Agricultural Bank of China reaches 24.68 trillion yuan, up 10.67%; China Construction Bank 23.01 trillion yuan, up 11.70%; Bank of China 17.58 trillion yuan, up 11.48%; Bank of Communications 2.16 trillion yuan, up 10%.

Among joint-stock banks, CITIC Bank’s financial assets management scale for individual customers reaches 5.36 trillion yuan, up 14.29% from 2024; Shanghai Pudong Development Bank manages individual AUM (including market value) of 4.66 trillion yuan, leading with a growth rate of 20.26%; Ping An Bank manages retail customer assets (AUM) of 42,384.09 billion yuan, up 1.1%; Industrial Bank’s retail wealth AUM (banking scope, excluding third-party stock market value) reaches 1.90 trillion yuan, up 9.88%.

As an important lever of wealth management business, in 2025, 15 banks’ agency business earned 144.9 billion yuan, up 241% year on year, but each bank’s agency business income performance diverges. As shown in the chart below:

Data source: Bank annual reports; compiled by Cailian Press

Agricultural Bank’s agency business income reached 30.464 billion yuan, up sharply 87.81% year on year, mainly due to the bank’s deep advancement of wealth management business transformation—growth in wealth management and fund distribution income—making it the most eye-catching bank in agency business income growth in 2025.

China Merchants Bank’s wealth management fee and commission income was 26.711 billion yuan, up 21.39%, mainly driven by both the growth in distribution scale and optimization of product structure; agency fund income was 5.846 billion yuan, up 40.36%, mainly affected by an increase in the year-on-year holdings and sales volume of equity fund products; agency insurance income was 5.823 billion yuan, down 9.37%, mainly due to changes in business structure; agency trust plan income was 3.518 billion yuan, up 65.55%, mainly because of growth in agency trust scale; agency securities trading income was 1.801 billion yuan, up 62.55%, mainly influenced by an increase in securities trading demand from customers in Hong Kong’s capital market. By the end of 2025, China Merchants Bank’s retail wealth product holdings had reached 64.1225 million accounts, up 10.15% from the end of the previous year.

Bank of China’s agency business income was 26.172 billion yuan, up 26.67%, with the stock of mutual fund distribution (for public funds) reaching 4,063.21 billion yuan, up 12.73% year on year.

In 2025, Zheshang Bank’s entrusted and agency business income was 2.791 billion yuan, up 23.22% from 2024, showing strong performance. According to its annual report, Zheshang Bank focuses on the main lines of “boutique,” “scenario-based,” and “allocation-oriented,” enriching asset allocation strategies and the distribution shelf. Based on the low-interest-rate market environment and customers’ needs to improve returns, it focuses on enriching strategies for various “fixed income+” products. In 2025, the year-on-year growth in the holding scale of “fixed income+” distribution products was 156.90%; seizing favorable opportunities in the capital market, it vigorously promoted the development of fund distribution business, with the year-on-year growth in holdings of non-cash public funds reaching 57.03%.

Meanwhile, Minsheng Bank’s agency business income was 3.428 billion yuan, down 6.16% year on year; Everbright Bank’s agency business income was 1.549 billion yuan, down 18.39% year on year; Postal Savings Bank’s agency business income was 8.4 billion yuan, down 8.55% year on year.

This divergence indicates that competition in wealth management has shifted from simple scale expansion to a deep contest of professional capabilities and product structure. Some banks achieved income takeoffs through forward-looking product layouts and channel strategies, while others may be facing transitional pains.

Four major features emerge in bank wealth management

Based on annual reports, Cailian Press summarizes that in 2025, major listed banks’ wealth management business showed four key characteristics: expansion of product shelves across all categories, systematic implementation of asset allocation service frameworks, deep empowerment through digital intelligence tools, and a restructuring of bancassurance business value. Each bank demonstrates its strengths in the above dimensions, forming a competitive landscape with different emphases.

In terms of product shelf construction, many banks continuously enrich their product matrices through strategies such as “broad entry with strict selection” and “full market + full group.” Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, following a “broad entry, strict selection” strategy, significantly increased the listing of fund products, innovated by launching agency commercial pension products and scenario tools such as “Daily Earnings” and “Wealth Management Fixed Investment Plans”; Bank of China sells and distributes 2,295 individual wealth management products and 5,246 public funds, with 20 partner wealth management companies, and was among the first to launch the first batch of floating-fee-rate funds and foreign-currency wealth management products, maintaining a leading position in the foreign-currency wealth management market.

In terms of systematically implementing asset allocation services, leading banks have moved from concept advocacy to tool-based, systematized implementation. China Merchants Bank’s “TREE Asset Allocation Service System” covers 11.7568 million customers; its wealth open platform “CaiCaiHao” has 172 resident institutions; the number of customers holding wealth products reaches 64.1225 million; Shanghai Pudong Development Bank refreshed and rolled out the “Finance Alpha” asset allocation service system and the AI intelligent agent “PuXiaoCai,” with 6.4473 million customers holding wealth management products; China Construction Bank built a mobile banking “Income Center,” providing cross-category and multi-period income analysis. Its investment wealth management scale exceeded 5 trillion yuan, and the number of wealth management customers increased by 8.03 million in 2025.

In terms of digital intelligence empowerment, AI tools have moved from concepts to the front line of business. China Construction Bank’s “Help Assistant” and CITIC Bank’s digital person “Xiao Xin” have cumulatively served more than 7.91 million customers, with satisfaction rates above 95%; Agricultural Bank’s “AI + wealth management,” etc., have been deeply embedded into the full process of investment research, investment advising, and companionship, effectively improving service efficiency and coverage.

In bancassurance business and integrated financial cooperation, Ping An Bank is especially outstanding. It embeds bancassurance business into its wealth management system. In 2025, its agency personal insurance income increased 53.3% year on year, and its premium volume increased 35.3% year on year. In addition, China Merchants Bank’s agency insurance premiums reached 1,476.55 billion yuan, up 25.96%.

In the future, whether considering banks’ development prospects under a low-interest-rate and low-interest-spread environment, or taking into account residents’ needs for preserving and increasing wealth under the low-interest-rate environment and the orientation toward common prosperity, banks’ wealth management business faces major development opportunities.

In a recent related research report, Industrial Bank Research pointed out that from the perspective of banks’ own profitability, in a low-interest-rate and low-interest-spread environment, the revenue of national banks has continued to come under pressure, and major national banks urgently need to find new profit growth points.

From residents’ wealth management needs, in a low-interest-rate environment, deposit products are no longer able to meet residents’ wealth management needs. Coupled with the decline of real estate’s position in residents’ allocation, demand for diversified asset allocation continues to rise. Banks’ wealth management business has been continuously shifting—from product sales to product allocation, and from single services to diversified services. In terms of AUM composition, retail deposits still account for a relatively large share in AUM of state-owned large banks, while some major joint-stock banks’ AUM has already formed a diversified and broad product structure.

In the future, how will banks improve advisory-style wealth management services from the product side?

Industrial Bank Research stated that selecting quality products is becoming an important direction for upgrading banks’ wealth management business. However, transforming wealth management business to a “buyer-side investment advisory” model requires coordinated support from multiple factors, such as account connectivity, product configuration, platform building, and incentive mechanisms. Besides laying the foundation on the product side, banks also need to adjust sales-side evaluation mechanisms accordingly to promote the client-centered, advisory-oriented development of wealth management.

(Cailian Press, Wang Wei)