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An increasing number of wealthy customers from mainland China are using Hong Kong to diversify their investments and expand their businesses globally, according to a senior executive of Hong Kong-based mid-tier lender China Citic Bank International.

“After many government efforts to promote family offices in recent years, we have seen strong growth from wealthy mainland customers seeking our bankers to help them set up family offices in Hong Kong,” said Wendy Yuen Miu-ling, head of the bank’s personal and business banking group, in an exclusive interview.

She said the bank, which uses the name CNCBI for short, had seen new cross-border wealth-management customers from the mainland triple in the first half of this year, while assets under management jumped 30 per cent.

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The growth of the wealth-management business helped boost the bank’s fee income by 50 per cent in the first half, while its private bank operating income increased by 60 per cent, Yuen said.

Rich mainland clients liked to set up family offices in Hong Kong “as a platform for them to diversify their investment portfolio”, she said, adding that as an international financial centre, the city offered them a wide range of international products to invest in.

Family offices are entities created by affluent individuals or families to manage their investments, succession planning and philanthropic activities.

CNCBI is the Hong Kong unit of mainland China’s Citic Bank, which is under the Citic Group. The group, established in 1979 by Rong Yiren with the support of late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping, has developed into a conglomerate with businesses in finance, manufacturing, infrastructure and other sectors.

“Being part of the Citic Group is important as the brand is well known on the mainland,” Yuen said. “Our wealth-management customers can also get services from other units of the group as we can offer them trustee, investment banking, securities trading and other services.”

In addition, mainland enterprises that open accounts at CNCBI can tap Citic’s other units around the world to support global expansion. The group’s securities arm would also help such customers raise funds in Hong Kong by issuing bonds or stocks to tap the city’s active capital market, Yuen said.

“While CNCBI is a mid-tier bank in Hong Kong, mainland customers like our bankers in Hong Kong to help them expand globally because Citic is a well-established large conglomerate,” she said.

Like larger peers including HSBC and Standard Chartered, CNCBI has invested in private banking in the city. Its new centre, which opened on September 29 in Citic Tower in Admiralty, offers a 180-degree view over Victoria Harbour. With a gross floor area of about 15,000 sq ft, it is double the size of the bank’s previous centre in Lippo Centre and offers 17 locally themed meeting rooms.

“Both local and wealthy mainland customers like to meet with our bankers, not just to manage their wealth but also to experience the cultural aspects of the city,” Yuen said. This was why the bank arranged cultural events, such as visits to the Art Basel show and the M+ museum, as well as exclusive cocktail receptions, she added.

Even in a digital age, physical venues played an important role in private banking and the wealth-management business, Yuen said. Besides its new private banking centre, CNCBI is upgrading many of its more than 20 branches.

“While clients may conduct simple banking transactions online, they would like to have a face-to-face meeting with their bankers in person to discuss financial planning, setting up of family offices and other complicated matters,” she said. “The 17 rooms of the new private banking centre are always fully booked.”

This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP’s Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright © 2025 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

Copyright (c) 2025. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

Alibaba Group Holding on Friday unveiled a 2 billion yuan (US$281 million) investment as part of a programme that will see a network of Taobao-branded convenience stores across China support the operations of the firm’s instant commerce and on-demand delivery business.

Rather than establishing Taobao Shangou’s own bricks-and-mortar shops, the programme would primarily provide existing convenience stores with a tech facelift, leveraging Alibaba’s digital infrastructure, according to Hu Qiugen, the instant commerce unit’s general manager. Alibaba owns the Post.

Under the programme, the operators of partner convenience stores would receive digital supply chain support from Alibaba’s domestic wholesale platform 1688.com, technical insights on product procurement and get their stock inventory replenished via the group’s Aoxiang platform, as well as Taobao branding.

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That technical support is expected to make certain each store provides “one-stop, 24-hour and 30-minute delivery” shopping service to consumers, according to Hu. Taobao Shangou’s partner convenience stores are expected to be rolled out in more than 200 cities on the mainland.

The first batch of Taobao partner convenience stores launched on Saturday in cities that include Hangzhou, the capital of eastern Zhejiang province, and Nanjing, the capital of eastern Jiangsu province.

“We are committed to ensuring a win-win within our ecosystem,” Hu said.

Taobao Shangou general manager Hu Qiugen speaks at Friday’s launch of the Alibaba unit’s new convenience store programme in Hangzhou. Photo: Sina alt=Taobao Shangou general manager Hu Qiugen speaks at Friday’s launch of the Alibaba unit’s new convenience store programme in Hangzhou. Photo: Sina>

Hangzhou-based Alibaba’s latest initiative further expands the scope of goods and merchants covered by its instant commerce push, more than two months after CEO Eddie Wu Yongming said the company had succeeded in scaling up user growth and making consumers prefer its platform over its rivals – including on-demand delivery giant Meituan and JD.com.

Taobao Shangou, which is accessible from the Taobao shopping app, currently has more than one-third of the traditional convenience stores in its ecosystem running round-the-clock operations.

Alibaba said monthly active users of Taobao Shangou reached 300 million in August, while daily orders hit a peak of 120 million.

China’s instant commerce market is expected to grow to 2 trillion yuan, according to estimates by the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, an institute under China’s Ministry of Commerce.

Meituan, meanwhile, has also been expanding the footprint of its instant commerce operation.

Beijing-based Meituan, which claimed that its instant commerce service has more than 500 million users, on Wednesday announced a partnership with over 10,000 brands. The company said it will help these brands establish virtual stores on its platform, while also providing them with digital tools, warehousing and logistics support.

This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP’s Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright © 2025 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

Copyright (c) 2025. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

BEIJING, Nov 2 (Reuters) – China Vanke, a state-backed property developer battling liquidity stress, said on Sunday its largest shareholder, Shenzhen Metro Group, agreed to provide loans of up to 22 billion yuan ($3.09 billion), a stock exchange filing showed.

One of China’s best-known household names, with many projects across bigger cities, Vanke is about a third owned by Shenzhen Metro.

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($1=7.1230 Chinese yuan renminbi)

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WARSAW, Poland — Poles met up with families and visited their beloved dead on All Saints’ Day, which was celebrated Saturday across the Catholic world.

All Saints’ Day, annually celebrated Nov. 1, is one of the most important days in the Polish calendar. Supermarket shelves are stacked with candles weeks in advance. As the day approaches, street vendors compete for spots near cemetery entrances, selling chrysanthemums and traditional snacks like pretzels, called “obwazanki” in Polish.

In cities across the country, special bus lines were introduced, with their final stops at the largest cemeteries. Inhabitants of big cities headed to the suburbs or villages where parents or grandparents live, so they can visit the graves of deceased family members together. Police officers set up special patrols, jokingly called “Operation Candle,” to keep the peace on the roads during the holiday.

Poland seemingly came to a standstill Saturday as people made their way to cemeteries to collectively honor those who have died. As the day turned to dusk, graves adorned with white and red candles and colorful flowers — set against the backdrop of orange autumn leaves — radiated warmth and comfort despite the somber occasion.