Bank of Qingdao Co., Ltd. disclosed its 2025 annual report on the evening of March 27. By the end of 2025, the bank's total assets exceeded 800 billion yuan for the first time, reaching 814.96 billion yuan, an increase of 18.12% compared to the end of the previous year. Operating income amounted to 14.573 billion yuan, up 7.97% year-on-year, while net profit rose 21.61% to 5.357 billion yuan, achieving growth in both revenue and earnings. Regarding asset quality, the non-performing loan ratio decreased to 0.97%, and the provision coverage ratio significantly improved to 292.30%.
Amid a complex environment characterized by deepening interest rate liberalization, persistent net interest margin compression, and intensifying competition in the banking sector, Bank of Qingdao has reached a new level in asset scale, achieved dual growth in revenue and net profit, and demonstrated positive improvements in asset quality, with a further strengthened provision coverage ratio. However, the bank still faces multiple challenges, including the recovery of its retail business and optimization of its revenue structure.
Corporate lending served as a stabilizing pillar, while retail lending continued to face pressure. In 2025, the expansion of Bank of Qingdao's asset scale accelerated noticeably. By year-end, total assets grew by 18.12% compared to the end of the previous year, surpassing 800 billion yuan for the first time to reach 814.96 billion yuan. Total customer loans amounted to 397.008 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 16.53%, while total customer deposits reached 502.899 billion yuan, up 16.41% year-on-year.
In terms of credit allocation structure, strengthening corporate banking became the primary driver of scale growth. Corporate loans for the full year totaled 296.656 billion yuan, an increase of 54.477 billion yuan from the end of the previous year, representing growth of 22.49%. In terms of allocation, traditional sectors such as wholesale and retail, leasing and commercial services, and manufacturing maintained strong growth, with increases of 39%, 26%, and 22%, respectively.
Simultaneously, the bank continued to focus on key financial sectors: loans for technology finance grew by 21.75%, inclusive finance loans increased by 18.03%, green loans rose by 57.47%, and blue loans expanded by 35.59%. The growth rates of specialized businesses like green and blue loans far exceeded the average loan growth rate of the bank, indicating initial success in its differentiated operations.
In contrast, retail lending remained under pressure in 2025. Full-year new retail loans were negative, decreasing by 4.3 billion yuan compared to the end of the previous year. Influenced by market conditions and other factors, both mortgage loans and consumer loans at Bank of Qingdao showed year-on-year declines during the reporting period. Growth was primarily reliant on business loans, which increased by 11.4% by year-end. However, retail deposits performed steadily, with a full-year increase of 32.4 billion yuan. The number of mid-to-high-end customers grew by 10.72%, and their share of held financial assets reached 86.94%, laying a foundation for the subsequent transformation of the retail business.
Net interest income supported over half of the performance, while non-interest income faced temporary pressure. From a profitability structure perspective, net interest income remained the absolute main contributor to Bank of Qingdao's 2025 performance growth. During the reporting period, the bank achieved net interest income of 11.07 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 12.11%, raising its proportion of operating income to 75.96%. During the interest rate downtrend, this growth was primarily achieved through volume compensating for price—offsetting the impact of narrowing interest margins by expanding interest-earning asset scale and increasing loan and financial investment allocations.
Data show that the bank's net interest spread and net interest margin for 2025 were 1.68% and 1.66%, respectively, narrowing by 8 and 7 basis points. Notably, the pace of margin decline showed a quarter-by-quarter slowing trend. The average cost rate of interest-bearing liabilities for the full year decreased to 1.81% from 2.18% in the previous year, with the average deposit cost rate falling by 33 basis points year-on-year to 1.75%. This indicates effective cost control on the liability side, with benefits emerging from the maturity repricing of existing term deposits and multiple rounds of deposit rate cuts.
Compared to the steady growth in net interest income, non-interest income became a drag in 2025. Full-year non-interest income was 3.503 billion yuan, a decrease of 120 million yuan, down 3.34% year-on-year. Breaking it down, net fee and commission income was 1.45 billion yuan, down 3.84% year-on-year, mainly dragged down by reduced wealth management service fee income. Net other non-interest income was 2.05 billion yuan, down 3% year-on-year. Although the rate of decline in non-interest income narrowed compared to the first three quarters, pressure to diversify the revenue structure persists.
Non-performing loans achieved a double decline, and provisions were further strengthened. In 2025, Bank of Qingdao's asset quality indicators continued to improve. By year-end, the non-performing loan ratio was 0.97%, down 0.17 percentage points from the end of the previous year, falling below the 1% mark for the first time. The balance of non-performing loans was 3.841 billion yuan, reduced by 32 million yuan from the end of the previous year. Structurally, asset quality showed divergence between corporate and retail segments. The corporate loan NPL ratio decreased by 0.27 percentage points from the start of the year to 0.6%, with the manufacturing sector NPL ratio declining significantly. In contrast, the retail loan NPL ratio increased by 0.56 percentage points from the start of the year to 2.58%.
During the reporting period, Bank of Qingdao's risk resilience significantly strengthened, with the provision coverage ratio大幅提升至292.30%, an increase of 50.98 percentage points from the end of the previous year. The bank stated in its annual report that it is continuously advancing the construction of its digital and intelligent risk control system, implementing refined dynamic management of asset quality indicators, strengthening the forecasting and analysis of risk migration trends, and enhancing preemptive risk signal handling capabilities.
It is noteworthy that rapid scale expansion also led to correspondingly higher capital consumption. By the end of 2025, Bank of Qingdao's capital adequacy ratio was 13.37%, down 0.43 percentage points from the end of the previous year, while its core tier 1 capital adequacy ratio was 8.67%, down 0.44 percentage points. Within the year, the bank successfully issued 2 billion yuan in perpetual bonds, providing some supplementation to its tier 1 capital. However, due to a 9.1% year-on-year increase in risk-weighted assets, the relatively high-intensity balance sheet expansion significantly consumed capital. The bank stated in its annual report that it will continue to adhere to a light-capital transformation strategy, accelerate the shift towards a capital-efficient development model, enhance refined capital management capabilities, increase profit retention, and promote the steady strengthening of endogenous capital replenishment.