China Everbright Bank Achieves Sustained and Stable Development in All Aspects of Business in 2007

　　The reporter learned at the 2008 work conference of China Everbright Bank (“the Bank” or “CEB”) held in Beijing on January 17 that the Bank deeply implemented the essence of the 17th National Congress of the CPC and the Central Economic Work Meeting and earnestly carried out the general arrangements of the work conference of China Everbright Group in 2007. Commanding the overall situations with a scientific concept of development, the Bank steadily pushed forward strategic plan, kept deepening reform and restructuring, and improved operational mechanism. While accelerating business innovation and strengthening risk management and internal control, CEB realized smooth business development, greatly improved operating results and asset quality, and completed financial restructuring. Its operating status and profitability improved significantly, laying a solid foundation for the introduction of strategic investors and IPO at the next step and sustainable development of the Bank.

　　As of the end of 2007, the Bank’s total assets were RMB725.7 billion, up RMB130.6 billion or 21.95% over the year beginning. Of which, outstanding loans were RMB418 billion, up RMB65.7 billion or 18.66%. The balance of corporate and savings deposits was RMB551 billion, up RMB31.2 billion or 6%. Net income from intermediary business was RMB1,414 million, up RMB731 million or 106.9%. Net interest income was RMB17,359 million, up RMB4,712 million or 37.3%. Operating profit was RMB10,948 million, up RMB3,105 million or 55.5%. Net profit was RMB4,567 million, up RMB1,809 million or 65.6%. The Bank disposed of non-performing assets (excluding loans to China Everbright Finance and China Everbright Group) of RMB11 billion in 2007, including non-performing loans of RMB9.1 billion. The Bank collected RMB6,102 million in cash, including non-performing personal loans of nearly RMB190 million. Provision coverage ratio reached 97.58%, an increase of 30.25 percentage points over the year beginning, indicating an obvious improvement in the risk resisting capability.

　　Reform and restructuring is a key point of the Bank’s operation in 2007. On August 5, the State Council formally approved the restructuring plan of China Everbright Group and China Everbright Bank. On November 30, China SAFE Investments Limited successfully injected RMB20 billion of equivalent in US dollar into CEB, greatly enhancing the Bank’s capital strength. That means CEB has made a significant move forward in the reform and restructuring and turned over a new page in its development history.

　　Business innovation is another shining point of the Bank’s operation in 2007, in which the Bank upgraded its sunshine wealth management series products in an all-round way. CEB issued RMB91.2 billion worth of such products in 2007, a year-on-year increase of RMB36.3 billion, and won the award “Bank RMB Wealth Management Product with Most Investment Potential”. In respect of investment banking business, it launched financial consulting service and structured loan broking business. CEB ranked first in the market in terms of both the number of issuers of short-term financing notes and the number of issues of such notes. Its bank-customs, bank-taxation, bank-finance and such other new corporate banking products have been recognized by the market, of which Bank-Customs Guarantee paid accumulative taxes of RMB9 billion, representing 40% of the market share and ranking first in the industry. Its credit card business also showed a robust development trend. In 2007, CEB issued 1,111,800 new cards, with accumulated trading value of RMB5,713 million and net income of RMB97 million. The Bank’s Credit Card Center successfully passed the ISO9001 quality management system review and the ISO27001 information security management system authentication, and the Customer Service Center passed the CCCS review.

　　CEB was also highly recognized by customers for its excellent performance in business innovation. In 2007, it received the title “Top 10 Chinese Banks” from related media, and won the award “Annual Most Innovative Bank” for the second successive year.

　　This meeting also put forward related requirements on the work of CEB in 2008, i.e. making great efforts to implement the Bank’s development strategy, deepening the system reform, strengthening business innovation and risk management, developing five projects, enhancing comprehensive competitiveness, and laying a solid foundation for developing CEB into an outstanding listed bank. Accordingly, the Bank should do a good job in the following six aspects: first, implementing the Bank’s strategy in an all-round way to achieve better and faster development; second, strengthening the management of customer base, and achieving balanced development of assets and liabilities; third, endeavoring to push forward innovation and build up Everbright brand; fourth, deepening reform and improving the system and mechanism that give an impetus to scientific development; fifth, strengthening management to guard against risks and lay a foundation for the healthy development of the Bank; sixth, deeply implementing the essence of the 17th National Congress of the CPC, and going all out to develop the talent and loyalty project, in an effort to provide a reliable guarantee of human resources for the long-term development of the Bank.