Profits at China’s listed banks are poised to grow by less than 10 per cent in 2014, for the first time since at least 2005, in the face of a slowing economy, financial reform and the challenge from internet newcomers, say analysts.
Chinese state-controlled banks have had high government-guaranteed profits for years, because of strict controls on lending and deposit rates that have helped fund China’s booming investment-led growth at a high cost to savers.
Now interest-rate liberalisation and new entrants into China’s savings sector – from shadowy wealth-management products to the online money-market products from Alibaba and others – are eroding the margins that traditional banks can earn.