Heavy Investment Wealth Management: What Are the Chances for the "Most Penetrated Bank"?

Ask AI · How Can Postal Savings Bank Turn Branch Strengths Into Wealth Management Revenue?

China’s bank with the most branches—Postal Savings Bank of China (hereinafter “Postal Savings Bank”)—is making a big, high-profile push to sound the starting horn for entering the wealth management market.

At Postal Savings Bank’s 2025 annual results press conference held on March 30, 2026, the bank’s President Lu Wei—appearing for the first time before the media and institutional analysts since taking office—claimed that it will treat unusually rapid development of fee-based (non-interest) business as a “second growth curve,” and will actively cultivate five major growth drivers including wealth management. The bank’s Retail Business Director Liang Shidong also said that it will proactively seek breakthrough development in wealth management, doing everything possible to grow and strengthen this business. In other words, Postal Savings Bank will place renewed emphasis on wealth management business that does not “eat the interest spread.”

The broader industry backdrop is well known: with the net interest margin falling to a historical low, banks that have long relied on “eating the spread” are all transforming to pursue non-interest income. In this new race moment, how can a bank like Postal Savings Bank—deeply rooted in counties through its branch network—overtake on a new track?

Researchers at the Southern Weekend New Finance Research Center, Lin Zhòng and Zong Heng, analyzing key indicator data, found that from 2023 to 2025, Postal Savings Bank’s private banking client segment grew far faster than its retail client base. The share of non-deposit AUM (asset management scale) increased step by step, but there is still a gap versus wealth management benchmark peers such as China Merchants Bank, and even the four major state-owned banks.

“Tip-of-the-Pyramid” Customer Segment Is Growing Fast

With effective demand for credit insufficient, banks that have long relied on “eating the spread” have struggled to grow revenue and profit, especially as net interest income has become a drag. As the commercial bank with the most branches in China, how does Postal Savings Bank perform in terms of asset expansion and profitability? The annual report shows that in 2025, Postal Savings Bank’s total assets were nearly 19 trillion yuan, ranking fifth among all banks and showing an expansion trend year over year; operating revenue and net profit attributable to shareholders were approximately 355.8 billion yuan and 87.6 billion yuan respectively, both increasing slightly year over year.

But similar to most banks, Postal Savings Bank’s revenue structure shows the characteristics of “interest spread under pressure, and non-interest driving strength.” Non-interest income—and the corresponding wealth management segment—has become the core engine for driving revenue growth. What is the business base of Postal Savings Bank’s wealth management operations in recent years? Where does it stand within the industry?

Southern Weekend New Finance Research Center researchers traced prior annual reports and calculated key data, finding that since Postal Savings Bank officially launched private banking in 2023, its private banking customers and private banking centers have developed rapidly. By the end of 2025, Postal Savings Bank’s private banking clients (clients with assets of RMB 6 million and above) increased for two consecutive years by 26%; the number of private banking centers expanded from the initial first batch of 4 in 2023 to more than 40.

Within Postal Savings Bank’s retail customer segmentation system, private banking clients sit at the top of the pyramid, followed by VIP clients (clients with assets of RMB 100k and above) and ordinary individual clients. From 2023 to 2025, the number of the latter two categories of Postal Savings Bank customers also continued to grow, but their growth rates were far lower than that of the “tip-of-the-pyramid” segment.

What does a faster growth rate in the private banking segment mean? A management professional who has worked at mainstream banks for many years explained to Southern Weekend New Finance Research Center researchers that from a cost-to-revenue perspective, private banking clients have larger per-client financial asset volumes. The cost a bank invests to maintain the same asset scale is far lower than that for ordinary customers. At the same time, private banking clients have more financial and comprehensive demand, which helps form more profit growth points. The fact that private banking clients are growing faster than other types of retail customers indicates that the value structure of Postal Savings Bank’s customer base is continuing to move upward—an outcome that suggests early effectiveness in wealth management.

Allocating concentrated advantages to serve the “tip-of-the-pyramid” customer segment is an operating logic that is repeatedly confirmed as the wealth management business continuously evolves. A review of the industry’s development history over nearly 20 years shows that although regulators set entry thresholds for private banking (private banking clients must meet criteria such as “net financial assets of RMB 6 million or above”), some leading banks set standards far higher than that. For example, in Postal Savings Bank’s private banking—[text continues as original].

As for customer development strategy for 2026, Liang Shidong said Postal Savings Bank has a private banking-focused action plan, which will enhance the bank’s capability to serve high-value clients. “We expect the number of private banking clients to double over the next three years.”

Right now, how does the number of Postal Savings Bank private banking clients compare with peers? Southern Weekend New Finance Research Center researchers compared recent data and found that as of mid-2025, the number of private banking clients at Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, Agricultural Bank of China, Bank of China, and China Construction Bank were all above 200k accounts. For Postal Savings Bank—whose private banking business started later—the gap remains significant.

Urban Business Must Step Up

Besides private banking as an anchor, the penetration of wealth management into retail AUM (asset management scale) is also a matter of intense industry attention. It can reflect the structural changes in retail customers’ assets migrating from deposits to non-deposit products, aligning with the fundamental nature of wealth management—“entrusted by clients to manage their assets on their behalf.”

“Non-deposit AUM share” is the most straightforward core indicator for measuring wealth management penetration. Therefore, in practical operations it has become a basis for assessing many banks’ retail business lines. Since each bank’s stage of wealth management development differs, and regulators do not require mandatory disclosure of this data, the indicator typically does not appear directly in financial reports. The Southern Weekend New Finance Research Center’s independently built indicator system for the “Golden Benchmark—Wealth Management Rankings” includes this metric as a key observation dimension and assigns it a relatively high weight.

How is Postal Savings Bank’s non-deposit AUM share performing? Southern Weekend New Finance Research Center researchers’ calculations show that from 2023 to 2025, Postal Savings Bank’s “non-deposit AUM share” has followed an increasing trend, consistent with the retail AUM trend over the same period. When comparing the static value at the end of 2025 horizontally, Postal Savings Bank ranked fifth among the six big banks, and the gap versus retail benchmark China Merchants Bank was particularly significant.

A relatively low non-deposit AUM share means the bank still has ample room to improve its wealth management business. Is it expected that Postal Savings Bank’s non-deposit AUM share can keep rising? Liang Shidong disclosed that in Postal Savings Bank’s incremental AUM in 2025, the non-deposit AUM share exceeded 30%. The asset mix in incremental growth has been clearly optimized. This suggests that with continuous pull from incremental non-deposit AUM, Postal Savings Bank’s overall non-deposit AUM share is expected to rise quickly. At the same time, the internal structure of incremental non-deposit AUM is also continuously improving, which is reflected on the revenue side.

However, Liang Shidong also acknowledged that Postal Savings Bank still has substantial room to grow its share in the mid-to-high-end market for wealth management. In terms of layout, county areas have long been a traditional strength of Postal Savings Bank. But to achieve a comprehensive breakthrough in wealth business, the bank must strengthen its urban business contribution.

Strengths Are Also Challenges

The gaps and the pace of evolution are showing up in parallel. What advantages and challenges does Postal Savings Bank have as it pushes deeper into wealth management?

The number of branches and a funding cost that is better than peers are fairly obvious advantages. Lu Wei said, “Postal Savings Bank has an unparalleled combination of network size, depth of penetration, and density of layout in China’s banking industry.” By the end of 2025, Postal Savings Bank had nearly 40k branches. In the same period, the “universe bank”—Industrial and Commercial Bank of China—had about 15k branches. The numerical gap between the two is clear. But in terms of branch distribution, Postal Savings Bank’s branches are more concentrated in county areas, and the quality of the customer coverage differs significantly from that of urban customer bases.

Southern Weekend New Finance Research Center researchers also compared related data across seven banks and found that in 2025, Postal Savings Bank’s average interest-paid rate on personal deposits was higher than those of the other five big banks, only slightly higher than China Merchants Bank, the “king of retail.” Lower interest-paid costs mean Postal Savings Bank can acquire personal customers at a relatively smaller price. Placing this advantage within the entire wealth management framework implies that Postal Savings Bank’s customer base for conducting wealth management business is more readily available, and the customer base’s stability is also relatively prominent.

In the actual business chain, customer acquisition and conversion belong to two different processes. Put simply, when customers come in, it does not necessarily mean they will buy wealth management products, funds, or insurance. Especially in county-area customer segments, risk appetite is generally lower. In a situation where financial awareness is insufficient and service follow-up is not in place, customers may be more inclined toward time deposits with principal protection. How to convert the advantage in customer acquisition into more wealth management income that becomes profit growth points is a pressing issue for Postal Savings Bank.

The management’s public statements reflect this practical need. Lu Wei said that Postal Savings Bank’s retail customer quality still has room to improve. In 2026, it will accelerate the growth of private banking clients and younger customer segments. At the same time, Postal Savings Bank’s AUM is still mainly deposits. This year, it will accelerate market opportunities to achieve a significant increase in non-deposit AUM.

With the direction already clear, how will the strategy be followed through? Liang Shidong outlined four major approaches: First, through a “both internal and external push” approach, grow wealth management and the private banking client segment. Internally, it will tap the potential of 680 million existing retail customers; externally, it will bring in new customers and funds through professional products and services. Second, through private-banking-specific initiatives, it will advance the operational business model into execution and improve service capabilities. Third, it will strengthen the headquarters’ product selection capability, increasing the layout and growth of flexible products such as “fixed-income plus” and equity funds. Fourth, it will continue with systematic capability building. By defining standard actions for each level and role, the bank can ensure that playbooks and strategies are transmitted efficiently, achieving large-scale growth in overall business size.

Agricultural Bank Experience May Be Learnable

As Postal Savings Bank advances into wealth management, whose experience is worth learning? If we compare county-area branch networks and layout, Postal Savings Bank has some similarities with Agricultural Bank of China.

In 2024, Agricultural Bank of China’s private banking AUM in county areas was 1.1 trillion yuan, accounting for more than one-third of its private banking AUM. In 2025, the incremental AUM of Agricultural Bank of China’s three customer groups—entrepreneurs, elders, and rural revitalization—each exceeded 160 billion yuan, and the sum of the three accounted for 20% of the incremental AUM that year. A series of data validates a logic: under guidance from the right solutions, customer attributes will no longer be a natural barrier to expanding wealth management business, and county markets can also become an important source of growth for private banking business.

Southern Weekend researchers organized Agricultural Bank of China’s practices in related fields in recent years and found that implementing a “big wealth management” framework and pursuing digital transformation are two key factors.

Under a big wealth management framework, banks no longer only sell wealth management products, funds, and insurance. Instead, they manage “clients’ money across the full lifecycle,” shifting from single-product sales to one-stop comprehensive financial services. Paired with this are制度 and system-building efforts, including building a wealth management platform that aggregates high-quality resources (such as institutions, products, and experts), enriching product supply, and deepening the review and reorganization of business processes. Digital transformation refers to using AI to build an integrated model for wealth management investment research, innovation, service, and risk control, improving customer acquisition ability and asset quality. In the private banking realm, it focuses on target enterprises such as national technology innovation demonstration companies, specialized and innovative “little giants,” and leading agricultural technology enterprises, using a “public-private coordination” integrated service approach to expand the target client base.

Southern Weekend Researcher Chen Yan, Intern Liu Xinyu, Xu Juanjuan

Editors Feng Yu