On August 28, Minsheng Bank held its 2024 interim results announcement conference, where Vice President and Board Secretary Li Bin addressed the bank's net interest margin performance and underlying reasons for the first half of the year.
She noted that the group's net interest margin for the first half reached 1.39%, representing a 1 basis point year-over-year increase, achieving stabilization amid industry-wide pressure on interest margins. However, the second quarter's net interest margin declined compared to the first quarter, primarily due to falling asset-side yields. With the overall decline in interest rate levels and intensified competition in asset deployment, second-quarter asset-side yields dropped approximately 6 basis points compared to the first quarter.
Looking ahead to the second half, she explained that in an environment of declining interest rates and relatively loose liquidity, the bank believes the supportive effect of falling liability costs on interest margins will continue to manifest. Additionally, with the ongoing advancement of banks' loan pricing system construction and continuous improvement in market-based pricing capabilities, asset yields are expected to stabilize.
She stated that future specific measures on both asset and liability sides will include several aspects.
On the asset side, the bank will coordinate to achieve a balanced approach between volume and pricing in asset business. First, it will increase deployment of high-quality assets, continuously directing credit resources toward key industries and sectors supported by the state to enhance the quality and efficiency of credit deployment. Second, it will improve risk pricing management capabilities by further refining loan risk pricing mechanisms, promoting reasonable loan pricing and stable asset yields through tiered pricing authorization, differentiated management, and refined specialization.
On the liability side, the bank will implement multiple measures to strengthen refined management of liability business. First, it will continue optimizing deposit structure by focusing on business scenario development, concentrating on enhancing payment and settlement services, and continuously increasing the proportion of settlement deposits. Second, it will implement refined liability pricing management by systematically conducting renewal, replacement, and retention conversion of medium and long-term high-cost deposits at maturity, while strengthening forward-looking assessment of market rates and reasonably arranging the scale and structure of interbank liabilities to collectively drive further reduction in liability costs.