Annual dividends exceed 110 billion yuan! Moving towards a world-class financial institution! Highlights from ICBC's 2025 Performance Conference

ICBC’s performance report for last year has been released!

In 2025, the banking sector exhibited distinct cyclical characteristics—continuous rises to new highs in the first half, a pullback in the third quarter, and a recovery in the fourth quarter. This year, ICBC (hereinafter referred to as “ICBC”) historically surpassed 50 trillion yuan in total assets, and even with its leading global asset scale, ICBC continues to pursue more refined asset-liability management and more comprehensive services, aiming for efficiency and quality, achieving both revenue and net profit growth throughout the year, thereby creating stable investment returns for shareholders through its high-quality development.

“As everyone knows, achieving positive growth targets under a gradually narrowing interest margin is quite challenging.” On March 27, ICBC held its annual performance meeting for 2025, where ICBC President Liu Jun stated, “The more complex the environment, the more valuable the results.”

Whether in the capital market or in industry development, ICBC undeniably remains in the spotlight. Liu Jun expressed that, standing at a new starting point for the “14th Five-Year Plan,” ICBC will take the lead in pioneering a new path among Chinese financial institutions to achieve the goal of building a world-class financial institution.

Stabilizer: Cash dividends of 110.6 billion yuan, the dividend rate will “reflect the market’s needs”

Cash dividends are a concrete manifestation of a listed company’s value creation and investor return capabilities. Last year, the A-share banking index rose by 12% throughout the year, with ICBC’s A-share price increasing by 21.54%, ranking among the top of listed banks. The outstanding performance in the capital market provided investors with the most direct dividend returns.

ICBC’s board secretary Tian Fenglin stated that since its listing in 2006, ICBC has cumulatively created cash dividend returns of 1.58 trillion yuan for shareholders, with a cash dividend rate maintained above 30% for several years, consistently topping the A-share total dividend list.

In 2025, ICBC expects to distribute a total cash dividend of 110.6 billion yuan, continuing to hold the position of the listed company with the highest total cash dividends in the A-share market. Among these, an interim dividend of 50.4 billion yuan has been distributed, and after completing corporate governance procedures, an additional year-end dividend of 60.2 billion yuan will be arranged. Based on the average share price for the year, the dividend yields for A and H shares are 4.22% and 5.99%, respectively, far exceeding the current fixed deposit rates and ordinary wealth management returns.

Looking back at the stock price performance over the past year, ICBC President Liu Jun candidly stated, “Of course, we hope the performance could be a bit better.” However, over an extended time horizon, Liu Jun believes, “If we can steadily achieve above-average comprehensive return levels each year, then ICBC will undoubtedly be a stabilizer in the capital markets.”

Regarding the current investor focus on increasing the cash dividend ratio, Liu Jun provided a positive response—“Our overall capital planning and dividend arrangements will be dynamically adjusted based on the market… People have also mentioned ‘can we make corresponding upward adjustments to the dividend rate,’ and as a market barometer, ICBC will certainly respond to the market’s needs and thoughts. If our adjustments can contribute to the healthy and sustainable development of the market, then ICBC will definitely lead by example.”

Liu Jun emphasized that ICBC will closely monitor changes and demands in the capital market regarding dividend arrangements, responding to everyone’s needs and calls.

Bright Colors: A large bank with assets of 53 trillion yuan can still achieve “double growth”

The brilliant performance in the capital market fundamentally stems from ICBC’s quality of performance growth and intrinsic value.

By the end of Q1 2025, ICBC’s total assets reached 51.5 trillion yuan, becoming the world’s first bank to exceed 50 trillion yuan in total assets; by the end of 2025, ICBC’s asset size further expanded to 53.48 trillion yuan, a 9.5% increase from the end of the previous year.

“We did not relax our pursuit of efficiency and quality simply because ICBC is large in size.” Liu Jun succinctly summarized the “bright spots” of ICBC’s performance in the concluding year of the “13th Five-Year Plan”:

First, in terms of operational efficiency, core indicators such as operating revenue, net income from fees and commissions, pre-provision profit, and net profit all achieved positive growth—ICBC achieved operating revenue of 801.395 billion yuan in 2025, a 1.9% increase from the previous year; net profit reached 370.766 billion yuan, a 1% increase year-on-year.

Second, concerning revenue structure, the net interest margin at the end of 2025 was 1.28%, a decrease of 14 basis points from the beginning of the year, with the decline gradually narrowing and showing signs of stabilization; net income from fees and commissions reached 111.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 1.6%, reversing the previously negative growth trend; other non-interest income reached 55.3 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 40.7%. All of these provided strong support for revenue growth.

Third, regarding asset quality, by the end of 2025, ICBC’s non-performing loan ratio was 1.31%, a decrease of 3 basis points from the beginning of the year, marking a continuous decline for five consecutive years; at the same time, the provision coverage ratio reached 213.60%, with a provision balance for loans of 852.3 billion yuan, an increase of 36.8 billion yuan or 4.5% from the beginning of the year, further enhancing risk absorption capacity.

“In 2025, the reserve capacity we created in financial income effectively improved the provision coverage capacity and provision reserves, preparing us better for future impacts from macroeconomic cycles,” Liu Jun stated.

Breaking New Ground: Moving Towards a World-Class Financial Institution

State-owned large banks are the main force in serving the real economy, and over the past year, ICBC’s core business has become more prominent and specialized.

Data shows that in 2025, ICBC’s loan issuance and bond investments increased by 4.8 trillion yuan, with domestic branches increasing RMB loans by 2.17 trillion yuan, maintaining leading market positions in both total and incremental financing. Among these, the advantages in ICBC’s corporate credit, retail business, and fintech sectors have been further consolidated.

ICBC Vice President Wang Jingwu introduced that by the end of 2025, ICBC’s manufacturing loans had surpassed 5 trillion yuan for the first time in the industry, reaching 5.2 trillion yuan, with an annual growth rate of nearly 20%; the public settlement volume in the commercial trade sector exceeded 220 billion yuan, and trade financing balances surpassed 1 trillion yuan, with over 1 million new commercial clients added throughout the year.

The field of technological innovation is a “must-win battleground” for current banking business growth, and ICBC already has a leading edge in this area—by the end of 2025, ICBC’s technology loans and strategic emerging loans had surpassed 6 trillion yuan and 4 trillion yuan, respectively; the coverage rate of “specialized and innovative” small giant enterprises exceeded 50%, a 22 percentage point increase from the beginning of the year.

A strong financial institution is one of the key elements in forming a strong financial nation. How to promote the construction of strong financial institutions? As a leading bank in China and globally, ICBC needs to pioneer a new path in this regard.

“A world-class financial institution has absolute standards; it is not something we can self-define,” Liu Jun stated frankly, emphasizing that ICBC must achieve the goal of building a world-class financial institution based on its existing foundation. If the balance sheet remains primarily loan-based, “then it is still quite far from this goal.”

Therefore, Liu Jun believes that ICBC needs to fully exert efforts to build a modern financial services industry based on a balance sheet primarily comprising indirect financing. In the areas of new productive forces and new infrastructure, it should transition from being a simple financial intermediary to a comprehensive service provider of capital, information, efficiency, and other value elements.

In fact, this is not the first time Liu Jun has proposed that financial institutions should transform into “comprehensive service providers.” At the recent China Development Forum 2026, Liu Jun systematically elaborated on this idea.

He believes that traditional flat and passive financial services can no longer fully adapt to the new demands brought about by the restructuring of the global landscape and rising economic uncertainties. It is essential to deeply integrate full lifecycle support and full industry chain services to build a systematic financial service framework for the real economy, transforming financial institutions into comprehensive service providers. This is the only way to buffer and resolve risks at individual nodes within a multidimensional grid.

Specifically, Liu Jun pointed out that expanding comprehensive services means focusing on key areas such as modern industrial system construction, technological innovation, green transformation, and coordinated regional development, enhancing collaboration across various business lines including commercial banking, investment banking, asset management, custody, wealth management, trading, and settlement to create comprehensive solutions for clients, transforming the institution’s strong supply capacity into value creation capability.

“Observing the overall income structure of world-class banks, we find that modern financial services are on the rise. This indicates that the capital market may give a higher valuation to modern financial services, which also requires ICBC to take the lead in pioneering a new path among Chinese financial institutions to achieve the goal of building a world-class financial institution,” Liu Jun emphasized.

Embracing the Turning Point: Net interest income is expected to turn positive year-on-year this year

Capital replenishment is currently a focal topic in the banking industry. This year, the “Government Work Report” has clearly proposed issuing 300 billion yuan of special government bonds to support capital replenishment, and insiders expect ICBC to be a key target for this round of special bond injections. In response, Tian Fenglin indicated at the meeting that the specifics will be based on formal announcements.

According to industry analysis, since last year, the injection of special government bonds into state-owned commercial banks has been continuously promoted, essentially a “preventive measure” to further strengthen the banks’ capital safety nets, thereby better serving the real economy.

Overall, ICBC’s Tier 1 capital net amount has ranked first in the global banking industry for 13 consecutive years. By the end of 2025, ICBC’s capital adequacy ratio was 18.76%, Tier 1 capital adequacy ratio was 14.94%, and core Tier 1 capital adequacy ratio was 13.57%, all operating smoothly within reasonable ranges; the TLAC (Total Loss Absorption Capacity) risk-weighted ratio was 21.47%, and the TLAC leverage ratio was 10.79%, both meeting regulatory requirements with buffer zones remaining.

Tian Fenglin revealed that ICBC has formulated a new round of capital and TLAC tool issuance plans, which will be reasonably advanced based on the future capital supply and demand situation and market operation conditions, ensuring that all regulatory indicators continue to maintain stable operations.

Additionally, regarding the industry’s “common question” of whether the turning point for the decline in net interest margins is approaching, ICBC Vice President Yao Mingde stated that ICBC’s interest margin is likely to show an “L-shaped” trend in 2026: while it is declining, the rate of decline is slowing, and this trend is sustainable.

“Unless we consider further significant adjustments to the LPR (Loan Prime Rate) and deposit interest rates, we expect our net interest income to turn positive year-on-year this year, marking a turning point, and the decline in net interest margins will also further converge compared to 2025,” Yao Mingde stated.

His judgment is primarily based on four factors: first, the asset-liability combination management is more aligned with the requirements of monetary policy adjustments; second, liability management focuses more on cost reduction and efficiency improvement; third, major asset allocation emphasizes long-term reserves; fourth, the asset-liability layout focuses more on a high-level open pattern.

On the liability side, Yao Mingde pointed out that ICBC relies on its strong foundation and service capabilities in custody, settlement, and deposit management to effectively attract and retain various low-cost funds; at the same time, as high-cost fixed-term deposits gradually mature, the impact of earlier adjustments in deposit interest rates has been gradually released, and loan repricing is nearing its end, with the interest spread between deposits and loans expected to stabilize.

Proofread by: Pandar