CCB Profits from Intermediate BusinessesThe China Construction Bank (CCB) announced Monday, December 25, a profit of 1.98 billion yuan (US$239 million) from intermediate businesses in the first 11 months this year.The figure represented an increase of 42 percent from the corresponding period last year, said a spokesman, adding that the bank now offers more than 100 kinds of intermediate services in nine categories. He said that during China's ninth five-year plan period (1996-2000), the bank has made great efforts to develop intermediate businesses in a view of improving banking services comprehensive competitiveness. This year the bank has listed intermediate businesses as one of its four pillar businesses. Statistics show that the bank's annual entrusted businesses in the five years has reached 200 billion yuan (US$24 billion) on average. This year alone the bank has handled a sum of 60 billion yuan (US$7.2 billion) from the central budget for infrastructure construction and geological prospecting and another 4.67 billion yuan (US$563 million) for the resettlement of people who left their homes for the construction of the Three Gorges project. So far the bank has developed a series of new products including agent commercial insurance, agent capital clearing in other cities, on-line banking and merchant banking. The agent commercial insurance business has been growing at an annual rate of over 100 percent, and the amount of trust fund has expanded from 2.2 billion yuan (US$256 million) to 14.5 billion yuan (US$1.7 billion). The spokesman said that in 1996-2000, the bank's profits from intermediate businesses reached 10.5 billion yuan (US$1.27 billion), an increase of 137 percent from that of the previous five years. |
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