The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) launched a new series of high-end wealth management centres in Beijing yesterday, preparing itself for anticipated foreign rivalry in the lucrative business.

The four Beijing wealth centres stand at the very top of the largest Chinese commercial bank's brand building strategy in the capital city, which was opened to foreign banks' local currency corporate business earlier this month.

The new centres, targetting the very top tier of its wealthy individual clients - those whose daily average of deposits at the bank stands above 2 million yuan (US$240,000) - follows a similar strategy staged two years ago that wooed clients with more than 300,000 yuan (US$36,000) in their ICBC accounts.

"These are the five-star stores that we have prepared for our high-end individual clients," said Li Xiaopeng, president of the ICBC's Beijing Branch.

The clients of the wealth centres are privileged with ICBC's best services, with specially-trained client managers tailoring personalized wealth management plans and keeping tabs on their portfolios to help prevent losses.

Besides ICBC's products, the centres will also recommend any other product available in the market to maximize the yield for the clients, Liu Xia, one of the client managers, told China Daily. Chinese banks are facing growing competitive pressure from foreign rivalry. Foreign banks have been allowed to provide local currency services to corporate Chinese clients in 18 cities.

(China Daily December 20, 2004)