Non-Interest Income Dragged
发布时间:2026-04-04 来源:华泰证券
China Zheshang Bank’s 2025 attributable net profit and revenue declined by 14.85% YoY and 7.59% YoY respectively, slower by 5.26pp and 0.81pp from the 9M25 levels, missing our prior forecasts of -1.53% and -3.46%. We attribute the underperformance to narrowing NIM and pressure on other non-interest income. The bank has proposed a 2025 dividend of RMB0.131 per share, representing a 30.06% payout ratio (2024: 30.12%). Based on the 30 March 2026 market close, the A/H-share dividend yields were 4.24% and 5.78% respectively. Maintaining its Zhejiang-focused strategy, the bank continues advancing its ‘low-risk balanced return’ transformation. We keep our OVERWEIGHT rating on the A-share and BUY rating on the H-share.
Loan mix optimized, NIM marginally declined
Total assets/loans/deposits increased by 4.7/3.5/6.3% YoY at 2025 year-end, with growth rates changing by +1.2pp/-0.3pp/-1.3pp from the September levels. Corporate loans drove 126% of the net new loan growth, while retail loans contracted by 22%, reflecting persistent weak demand. For 2025, net interest income declined by 1.5% YoY, although the pace improved by 1.7pp from end-September. The full-year NIM was 1.60%, decreasing by 7bp from 9M25, with the yield on interest-earning assets/cost of interest-bearing liabilities at 3.31/1.85%, down by 16/10bp from 1H25. While asset yields kept falling, liability cost reductions partially offset the pressure. The bank intensified lending to key sectors despite yield compression, while growing low-cost deposits. The deposit interest rate fell by 32bp YoY to 1.78%. Demand deposits accounted for 24.5% of total deposits at 2025 year-end, down by 1.5pp from 1H25, indicating ongoing term deposit migration.
Fee income decline moderated, non-interest income fell
For 2025, non-interest income fell by 19.7% YoY, with the pace of decline worsening by 5.5pp from 9M25. Net fee and commission income dropped by 16.4% YoY, showing improvement from the 22.4% contraction in the first three quarters of the year. Agency income rose by 23% YoY, outperforming other
segments due to strong wealth-management sales. Other non-interest income declined by 20.6% YoY, with the drop widening by 8.8pp from 9M25. This primarily reflected bond market volatility, as trading asset returns decreased YoY. Notably, 4Q25 saw significant fair-value fluctuations, recording an RMB1.49bn loss. The cost-to-income ratio rose by 1.8pp YoY to 32.1% in 2025. ROA and ROE declined by 0.09pp and 1.69pp YoY to 0.40% and 6.80% respectively, reflecting margin pressure.
Target PBs of 0.48x/0.40x for A/H-shares in 2026
Considering non-interest income volatility, we project 2026/2027/2028 net profit at RMB13.0/13.3/13.6bn (13.68/13.70% cuts from our prior estimates for 2026/2027). We estimate 2026 BVPS at RMB6.82 (previous for 2025E: RMB6.72), implying PBs of 0.45/0.34x for the A-/H-shares. Comparable banks trade at 0.52/0.61x 2026E PB on Bloomberg consensus for A/H peers. Given uncertain earnings recovery visibility, we assign 2026E target PBs of 0.48/0.40x for the A-/H-shares (previous: 0.50/0.45x), for our target prices of RMB3.27/HKD3.10 (previous: RMB3.36/HKD3.29). Maintain OVERWEIGHT on the A-share and BUY on the H-share.
Risks: slower asset-quality recovery than we expect; delayed earnings improvement.