PSBC Official Announcement! New AIC Approved for Operations, State-Owned Major Banks "Complete the Set" of Licenses!

The sixth state-owned major bank financial asset investment company (AIC) has been approved to commence operations!

On March 20, China Post Savings Bank announced that it recently received approval from the State Financial Regulatory Administration. The bank’s newly established China Post Financial Asset Investment Co., Ltd. (referred to as “China Post Investment”) has been authorized to start operations. China Post Investment has a registered capital of 10 billion RMB and is registered in Beijing. After eight years, the sixth financial asset investment company affiliated with a major state-owned bank has finally been established, completing the full set of AIC licenses for all major state-owned banks.

According to securities industry sources, the legal representative of China Post Investment is Du Chunye, who is currently Vice President and Secretary of the Board of China Post Savings Bank. He oversees the bank’s corporate finance business and leads the development of the “1+N” corporate finance operating system. Du Chunye previously stated at an earnings presentation that the purpose of establishing the AIC subsidiary is to integrate China Post Investment into the bank’s overall development through a comprehensive service matrix, making it a key part of the new “1+N” corporate finance system.

On the day of establishment, China Post Investment announced cooperation with 14 entities

In its March 20 announcement, China Post Savings Bank stated that China Post Investment will support technological innovation and private enterprises by conducting market-oriented debt-to-equity swaps and equity investment pilot projects, helping to develop new productive forces.

Securities industry sources learned that on the same day, China Post Savings Bank held a “China Post Investment Service for Technological Innovation Launch Conference,” attended by Liu Aili, Chairman of China Post Group, and Zheng Guoyu, General Manager of China Post Group. The event was hosted by the bank’s newly appointed President, Lu Wei.

At the launch event, China Post Investment announced signing framework agreements with 14 entities in fields such as integrated circuits, clean energy, advanced manufacturing, and industrial investment.

The bank explained that China Post Investment will build an integrated financial service ecosystem encompassing “equity, loans, bonds, and investments,” focusing on market-oriented debt-to-equity swaps. Its mission is to “invest early, invest small, invest long-term, and invest in hard technology,” empowering the cultivation of tech enterprises and supporting the high-quality development of traditional, emerging, and future industries.

At the end of August last year, Du Chunye explained the overall strategic plan for the new AIC subsidiary during the bank’s earnings briefing. The goal is to create four major platforms: an innovative platform for loan and investment linkage, a long-term capital platform for technological innovation, a structural reform debt-to-equity platform, and an equity investment management platform.

In fact, in March 2025, the Financial Regulatory Administration issued a notice on further expanding the pilot program for financial asset investment companies’ equity investments, supporting qualified commercial banks to initiate the establishment of financial AICs based on the existing five state-owned bank AICs.

Subsequently, the expansion of AIC licenses accelerated significantly. The first new licenses were granted to three joint-stock banks: Industrial Bank, China Merchants Bank, and CITIC Bank. In November last year, Industrial Bank’s subsidiary Xingyin Investment opened in Fuzhou; China Merchants Bank’s subsidiary Zhaoyin Investment launched in Shenzhen; and in December, CITIC Bank’s subsidiary Xinyin Jin Investment opened in Guangzhou, completing its first investment.

Accelerated expansion of AIC equity investment pilot projects

With the official launch of China Post Investment, the number of bank-affiliated AICs increased to nine, including six state-owned bank AICs and three joint-stock bank AICs, marking a substantive industry advancement. As “patient capital” bridging indirect and direct financing, AICs are becoming key tools to solve financing difficulties for tech companies and to cultivate new productive forces.

Currently, AICs’ equity investment pilot scope covers 18 regions nationwide, mainly focusing on strategic emerging industries such as integrated circuits, artificial intelligence, new energy, and biomedicine, forming a relatively complete tech-finance service network.

Industry analysts pointed out that AICs’ core advantage lies in their synergy of investment and loans, providing comprehensive financial services across the entire lifecycle of tech startups, balancing support for innovation with risk control. Although AICs engaged in equity investments are still in the early stages, they possess strong capital strength and patient capital characteristics.

With favorable policies, AIC equity investment projects are experiencing a “boom.” According to Tianyancha business registration data, by August 2025, eight AICs had registered a total of 131 funds, far exceeding the 59 funds registered in all of 2024. Notably, since 2026, several AICs have registered an additional 29 new project funds.

Specifically, in 2025, ICBC’s subsidiary ICBC Investment registered 43 new funds, ranking first; China Merchants Bank’s Zhongyin Asset Management and China CITIC Bank’s Xinyin Jin Investment each established 23 funds; China Construction Bank’s CCB Investment and Agricultural Bank’s AgBank Investment set up 21 and 18 funds respectively. These new funds are mainly concentrated in 18 pilot cities, such as Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou, Nanjing, and Chongqing.

For example, the three newly established joint-stock bank AICs have already begun deploying their investments shortly after opening last year.

Xingyin Investment focused on semiconductors, photovoltaics, lithium mining, and engineering plastics, with total investments exceeding 6 billion RMB by the end of 2025; Zhaoyin Investment targeted the new energy vehicle sector, investing 500 million RMB in the capital increase of Shenlan Automobile, holding a 2.4187% stake; Xinyin Investment invested in Shenzhen Port Hua Dingxin Clean Energy Co., recently injecting 85.5755 million RMB into Henan Bailian New Materials Co.

Potential to expand banking business scope

Besides actively supporting China’s technological innovation and new productive forces, the expansion of bank-affiliated AICs is also expected to open new opportunities for banks’ own business development.

Yuan Zheqi, an analyst at Ping An Securities, stated in a previous report that the AIC industry is expected to see rapid growth in the future. In terms of operations, controlling shareholders can use AIC funds to invest in non-listed companies, greatly enhancing the value of the AIC’s financial license, and also alleviating the current mismatch of risks and returns in banks’ investments in tech enterprises. This can strengthen support for tech companies through methods like “investment and loan linkage.”

Huatai Securities’ report suggests that from a bank’s perspective, under the backdrop of declining interest rates, profit margins from traditional deposit and loan businesses are narrowing, necessitating the search for new profit growth points and a move toward comprehensive transformation. Opening up equity investment permissions allows banks to break through traditional credit boundaries and explore high-end manufacturing, biomedicine, artificial intelligence, and other promising fields. Additionally, banks can leverage their corporate banking resources to identify high-quality tech projects and provide integrated services.

However, industry insiders also point out that despite the strong momentum of AIC development in recent years, there are still structural bottlenecks in the institutional environment and operational mechanisms. For example, some management systems are not fully aligned with the intrinsic laws of equity investment; the inherent tension between the debt-like attributes of capital and the long-term, high-risk tolerance of equity investments remains; and business processes often struggle to simultaneously meet the flexibility and efficiency required for equity investments. These issues require coordinated policy, regulatory, and internal governance innovations and breakthroughs.