OREANDA-NEWS. October 11, 2011. Since January this year, ICBC continues to escalate its global presence while keeping abreast the pent-up demand of global financial services from the customers and focusing on improving competitive edge of the overseas subsidiaries. Growth trajectory of the Bank's international franchise has been strong in terms of scale, quality and efficiency, reported the press-centre of ICBC.

ICBC's aggregate assets in overseas subsidiaries rose 37.2% over the end of 2010 to USD 103.869 billion at the end of June. In the January-June period of 2011, overseas subsidiaries of ICBC posted a USD 735 million pre-tax gain, rising 43.0% year-on-year and chalking another historic high.

As related by an executive with ICBC, up to end of June, the Bank has 220 overseas subsidiaries in 29 countries/regions and a global network of 1,516 correspondent banks in 134 countries/regions spreading over five continents of Asia, Africa, Europe, America and Australia for the better delivery of services to customers in different markets across the world. The opening of five branches in Europe on January 17 this year, namely, Paris Branch, Brussels Branch, Amsterdam Branch, Milan Branch, Madrid Branch, demonstrates the Bank's service network in Europe.

In South Asia market, ICBC received a business license granted by the Reserve Bank of India (India's Central Bank) for a branch in Mumbai on May 16. The two branches in Pakistan, Karachi Branch and Islamabad Branch, were also open to business on May 20 after going through the application procedures in a short period. ICBC was the only Chinese commercial bank in Pakistan to open branches. On August 5, ICBC reached agreement with South Africa Standard Bank Group on the sales and purchase of Standard Bank Argentina. Until then, ICBC has been progressing smoothly in extending its financial service network across the globe.

While gaining its global footprint, ICBC continues to execute its strategy of "One Branch, One Policy" in a bid to sharpen the competitiveness of overseas subsidiaries. On one side is to push their localization. On the other hand is to encourage cooperation between domestic and overseas branches by paying attention on the unified operation in home and foreign currencies. The objective is to improve the self-progress of overseas subsidiaries and their ability to sustain profit. Take the five European branches as an example.

As economic and trade between China and Europe growing steadily, these five ICBC branches, since opening to business in January this year, have been very active to work with domestic branches and other overseas subsidiaries to provide a full range of financial services to companies in Europe and China. More important, the five ICBC European branches stick to a business roadmap of localization through full utilization of local resources to loom large. Amsterdam Branch, in just a short period of 5 months, has attracted USD 250 million of deposit from corporate clients as one option to improve its capital-supply capability. The strong growth of all businesses drives their profitability. All five branches of ICBC in Europe posted profit in just six months after inception. This marks another historic record in terms of the speed of achieving profitability by the new overseas subsidiaries of a commercial bank across the world.

Not only the branches in Europe, FOVA, an integrated business processing system has been installed in 27 overseas subsidiaries so far. ICBC leverages its unified IT platform across the globe to promote nine product lines (including trade finance, syndicated loan, investment banking, personal banking, wealth management, private banking, cash management) outside China. As a result, overseas subsidiaries have significantly increased their number of overseas customers and business scale.

ICBC opens a new ground in the localization of retail banking for overseas subsidiaries by bundling the bank card service with Internet Banking. At the end of June, ICBC has opened internet banking service in 17 overseas subsidiaries. Online personal users and corporate clients increase 19.7% and 16.5% respectively over the end of previous year. Over 200,000 credit cards have been issued overseas. Number of personal customers in overseas subsidiaries rose 31.8% over the end of previous year, while personal deposit and personal loan went up 28.7% and 22.8% respectively. In cash management, ICBC effectively extends its service radius by setting up Asia Pacific Cash Management Center in Hong Kong, and China-Africa cash management platform with South Africa Standard Bank.

Today, ICBC has 1508 cash management customers across the globe. In special finance and investment banking, ICBC lends intensive support to Chinese enterprises to "go global", providing investment banking service and financial support to top customers for their overseas acquisition and investment projects. In the first half of 2011, ICBC concluded the major restructuring and M&A project - GCL Group's acquisition of a power plant in China, and achieved good result in the Wuhan Iron & Steel Group's acquisition of an iron mine in Madagascar. ICBC International, the investment banking arm of ICBC, has successfully participated in the IPO of Prada and Ferragamo, large IPOs of international influence. During the first six months of 2011, overseas subsidiaries have generated a revenue of RMB 392 million from investment banking, representing a year-on-year growth of 18.7%.