Good afternoon. Welcome you and my big thanks to you for participating in 2026 BOC interim results release amid this rain.

My name is Liu Chenggang, EVP and Deputy Secretary of BOC. Today's release will be co-hosted by me and BOC spokesperson Yu Ke.

This release is web broadcasted simultaneously. Welcome friends online.

I want to introduce the leaders of BOC. Vice Chairman, President, and Chief Compliance Officer Zhang Hui, EVP Cai Zhao, and EVP Wu Jian, EVP Huang Xueling.

We have our directors online. The 2026 interim results of the bank have been announced externally.

The PPTs can be downloaded from our website. Today all the financial data are compiled according to IFRS.

Now I want to give the floor to Zhang Hui to introduce to you the interim results of the bank.

Dear investors, analysts, media friends, good afternoon. Welcome you to BOC 2026 interim results announcement.

It's a great pleasure to meet old and new friends. 2026 is a meaningful year for BOC.

On the one hand, as the first A plus H dual listed bank in China, this year marks the 20th anniversary of our IPO. After 20 years of continuous operation, our bank, with a history of more than 100 years, have achieved a better copy the governance, globalized operation, and diversified business transformation with asset scale grew by 8x and overseas institutional coverage expanded from 27 countries to 64 countries.

We are coming from a big bank to a stronger bank. This year also marks the end of the 14th Five-Year Plan and the beginning of the 15th Five-Year Plan.

In the past five years, the BOC continuously improved its comprehensive stress, operating revenue, net profit, and NIM stabilized first among peers. The net interest income contribution increased to 33%.

Asset and liability grew by more than 50%. The globalization advantage has been further consolidated.

Overseas profit contribution improved by 4.6 percentage points. NPL, the lowest among peers.

The CAR ratio ranks as number eight among G-SIBs. In the first half of the year, we have completed our operating targets with good quality enhancement.

First, financial performance achieved a steady growth. In the first half, operating revenue RMB 357.1 billion, profit before provision RMB 230.4 billion, an increase of 8.41% and 9.77% respectively.

Net profit attributable to shareholders of the bank grew by 4.67% and 5.10% respectively. The growth rate achieved quarter-on-quarter growth since 2025.

NIM stabilized 1.27%. Net interest income grew by 10.20%.

Cost income ratio decreased by 1.68 percentage point. Operating efficiency further enhanced.

Asset and liability continuously improve its quality. Total asset exceeded RMB 40 trillion, an increase of 4.77% as compared to the end of last year.

Loan and bond and other high-yield assets improved by 1.32 percentage point. Domestic RMB loan grew by RMB 1.2 trillion, a growth of 5.98%.

Total liability reached RMB 36.95 trillion, a growth of 5.11%. Overseas current deposit percentage also increased.

Domestic RMB deposit interest rate reduced by 22 basis point. Liability cost is within control.

Asset quality is stabilizing. NPL ratio 1.22%, down 0.01 percentage point.

Newly incurred NPL reduced. NPL balance also reduced.

Provision coverage ratio 285%, up 0.48 percentage point by the end of last year. CAR ratio 18.31% and 80 basis points higher than the previous quarter.

BOC stick to the principle of creating value through prudent operation and generate shareholder trust through stable return. Since IPO, BOC have made payout of cash dividend of more than RMB 1 trillion with payout ratio maintained at a high of 30%.

To mark the 20th anniversary of our IPO, we suggest that the payout ratio to be increased to 31%, and we declare a cash dividend of CNY 1.19 per 10 share. We sow in spring and reap in autumn, hard work will be rewarded.

At the end of March, in our annual result release BOC talk about our six orientations. In the first half of the year, our good performance demonstrated the correctness of our thoughts and the correctness of our six orientations.

First, I want to introduce you optimization. Our global competitiveness have been further improved.

Globalization is within the gene of BOC, and also the strength of our operation in 100 years. In the first half of the year, we focus on three advantages of global operation, further polish our brand, and create pillar for our performance.

Overseas net profit contribution maintained above 27%. We continuously expand our global network.

Our global network cover 64 countries and regions, and number two in terms of institutions within the world. In Hong Kong and Macau, we maintain a leadership position.

In G20 countries, BRIC countries, and 10 ASEAN countries, and 21 APEC economies, we all have institutional presence. BOC have provided high quality globalized financial services, which won market recognition.

In this year, we won clearing bank status for RMB in England, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia. The RMB clearing network covers 19 countries and regions.

We underwrite upon about of 38 billion and assist overseas issuers to get RMB direct financing exceeding 110 billion. Cross-border advantage are overwhelmingly leading the peers.

Cross-border RMB business is a scale rank as number one in the world. We fully leverage our global service ecosystem and serve companies going global and investing into China.

We iteratively upgrade our multi-layer, multi-dimensional global services, and we help the country contribute to the establishment of overseas comprehensive service system by the country. We rely on our network in 64 countries and regions to provide cross-border investment promotion endeavors of the government.

We provide services to 90% of the Fortune 500 companies in China, and we provide 7 by 24 multi-currency cash pool services. We provide across-the-clock services and fund transfers and settlements can be done within seconds.

We take the lead and establish the first Chinese global custody bank overseas, and cross-border custody scale increased by 16.20%, 19.38% respectively. We upgrade BOC global salary payment and provide stock incentive for services to listed Chinese companies in overseas market.

We enhance global organizational strength. In the past 100 years, we have accumulated capacities in corporate governance, talent team, compliance system, and risk control capacity.

This is our most precious asset. In the first half, we further strengthen regional intensive and integrated development.

We further consolidate Hong Kong regional headquarters, strengthen BOC Europe regional headquarter, and we have established expatriate register with more than 10,000 talents on the list. In international settlement, FOREX transactions, AML compliance, we have a large talent reserve.

Also we further promoted overseas compliance management. Overseas compliance management momentum is stable.

We further establish a bank-specific risk management policy, and we review this policy on a regular basis. We align risk appetite with our strategic goals and development capacity, so as to elevate our risk control capability to a new level.

Second, we expand into new businesses to serve the real economy. We focus on the five financial priorities, and we are a leading bank in tech finance.

Tech loan balance take up more than 1/3 of our total corporate loan. We, in total, served 200,000 tech companies.

We have a full team presence across key technology sectors. We provide services to 5,200 core AI companies and in total, green finance balance grew by 13.32%.

Green bond underwriting scale, investment scale rank among the top in the industry. Inclusive finance provided to micro and small enterprises grew in amount and the customer number by 10.6%, 8.19% respectively.

Individual pension contribution grew by 54%, and elderly care industry loan balance grew by 50%. Digital finance empowerment enablement have been further enhanced.

MAU of mobile banking increased by 6.6%. Cross-border E-commerce transaction amount grew by 24% year-on-year.

Digital RMB consumption amount are among the top in the market. POE loan balance grew by 9%.

We also support the domestic consumption market loan in the first half, CNY 200 billion, and have to stabilize the real estate market. In total, we provided individual consumption loan to 3 million customer.

We also provided interest rate subsidy for installment payment. We make a continuous movement to create value.

We cope with opportunities and challenges in external environment, and we actively promote volume and price synergy, optimize domestic and overseas asset and liability structure, fully leverage our global presence and multicurrency businesses. NIM stabilized in the first half.

NIM improved by 2 basis points as compared to the first quarter. That's for RMB.

For foreign currency NIM, it improved by 13 basis point, contributing to group NIM stabilization. We continuously optimize our revenue structure and expand into wealth management, payment settlements, transactions custody and other capital light businesses.

We expand the source of net interest income to generate higher comprehensive return. Individual customer wealth management, custody business, settlement and clearing fee income grew by 22%, 10% and 4% respectively.

Net interest income percentage was more than 13%, among the top in the peers. We stick to capital intensive operation, and we focus on the philosophy of saving capital and create value at the same time.

We optimize our off-balance sheet and within balance sheet asset structure, strengthen refund management of capital, reduce and optimize the capital consumption of businesses, and expand capital light businesses. Fourthly, we want to be stronger in many businesses to provide comprehensive services to our customers.

The total number of corporate customer exceeded 9 million, a growth of 7.54%. Targeting the long-term development, we focused on the government clients and connected party actors to provide an ecosystem of services.

We are providing a banking plus ecosystem for open-ended financial services. We are also expanding seven customer segments, and our effective individual customers have expanded to 409 million.

For mid-to-high end individual customers, there has been a 5.84% over the end of last year. We have enhanced key business products and services such as third party custody, payroll services, fast payment, and social security card-like products.

For cash management accounts and daily average deposits, they have grown by 7.94% and 10.69% respectively. For asset custody business, the total size has reached RMB 26.75 trillion with 10.27%.

For the comprehensive financing projects, there has been a 20% year-on-year growth. Number five, we have made our business development even more stable with the balance between development and security underpinned by comprehensive risks management.

We have pushed forward the look-through risk management for domestic and overseas institutions, making risk management more capable, effective and efficient. Second, we have strengthened asset quality management by optimizing the longer acting mechanism for loan management, intensive and centralized measures, and the resilient measures to dissolve the NPL assets.

Thirdly, we have further optimized internal controls and compliance management with a three line defense system, with compliance and risk management always in place. Number six, we are more tilted towards what we call intelligence.

We are pressing ahead with digital intelligence empowerment and underpinning technology stack. We are pressing ahead with 40 technology strategic projects.

The delivery cycle has been reduced by 15% in terms of timing, and we are expediting the plan of AI Plus. For BOC AI large language models, there has been over 32,000 customers covering 3,800 scenarios.

Number three, we are making our channels more efficient and the paperless processes have been expanded to 70%. Number four, we are deepening science and technology innovation and expansion of results.

We have deployed over 190 innovative results with 37 high value achievements being incorporated into rollout programs. Last but not the least, the board meeting this morning adopted the 15th Five-Year Plan for BOC, establishing our priorities and directions for the next five years of high quality development.

We are building ourselves into a strong financial institution, focusing on six areas of capacity building. We are going to improve our capabilities to serve the real economy, global footprint, and international competitiveness.

We are enhancing comprehensive customer service capabilities, risk management capabilities, integrated operational capabilities, and a high caliber talent pool. For the second half, we are going to press ahead with our targets orientation, mid to long-term planning, and the focus on tech financing and other key areas of priority.

We are going to better serve the real economy while giving full play to our globalized footprint and strengths with comprehensive customer services. We will firmly guard the bottom line of no systemic financial risks ever happening.

We are going to leverage this good momentum to roll out the 15th Five-Year Plan while pressing ahead with high quality development, with sustained long-term value so as to pay back to our customers, investors, and the entire society as a whole. Thank you for listening.

Now let us kick off the Q&A. Please ask one question every time and please identify yourself with your organization before asking the question.

Now the floor is open to analysts and investors.

Lady from the sixth row.

Thank you for giving me this opportunity. I am from Guotai Junan Securities.

Martin Li, my name. I have a question about asset and liability management.

Since the beginning of 2026, lower speed and higher quality has become the new normal. I would like to invite management to talk about asset and liability management for the second half of this year and key loan extension directions, especially the balance between domestic and overseas loan extension for the mid and longer-term future.

In this new development stage of the 15th Five-Year Plan, how do we find the right balance between growth and quality?

President Zhang.

Thank you for the question. We have continued to play the role of serving the real economy as a key player while transmitting the relatively easy monetary policy with multiple measures.

For example, for the first half of this year, we grew our RMB loan by 5.96% higher than the industry average. We are also adding up to a bond investment with 10.6% growth rate in our domestic business, higher than that of last year.

We focus on tech, green, and inclusive finance with higher than average growth rate. We are also seizing opportunities of foreign trade development and Chinese companies going global.

Our overseas commercial banking loans have created a five-year high with double-digit growth for overseas RMB denominated loans. We are shifting gear in economic development and restructuring.

As you have pointed out, lower speed and high quality has become the new normal. We are going to cater to these trends while finding the right balance between domestic and overseas market and the right balance between volume and price so as to push for balanced development of asset and liability management.

How do we find the right balance between domestic and overseas loans? Let me focus on the two following aspects.

Our domestic business with the stable overall volume and a better service for key areas. We are going to make our support for real economy more efficient and effective.

We are going to make sure that our RMB loan growth rate is higher than average. We will continue optimizing loan structure while supporting more and more new quality productive forces.

We are going to focus on the five priorities with tech innovations, green development, and mid to long-term manufacturing as the key areas of loan support. We are aligning ourselves with the key projects of the 15th Five-Year Plan of the country.

We are also implementing the synergistic tools between fiscal and monetary policies such as making use of fiscal industry interest rate subsidy tools. For overseas business, we will continue to regard globalization as a core mandate while maintaining a good growth momentum for loan extension, serving, bringing in, and going out initiatives.

We will focus on smart manufacturing, renewable energy, new materials, and the biopharmaceutical industry as key industries of support. We are also providing more and more better financial services for foreign companies.

In this way, we are providing comprehensive and better quality comprehensive financial services for Fortune 500 companies and leading Chinese companies. We are assisting in the buildup of RMB ecosystem with ensuring a high quality business development of overseas institutions.

Talking about how are we going to find the right balance between growth on the one hand and quality on the other during the 15th Five-Year Plan. During the morning session, the board adopted our 15th Five-Year Plan, establishing a blueprint for our next five years of development and growth in order to implement our own 15th Five-Year Plan while analyzing opportunities and the risks and the external environment, and soliciting extensive opinions.

We will continue to focus on the five priorities of the financial sector, enhance comprehensive risk management and compliance management. We are going to strengthen our global talent pool, and we are going to further promote global international use of the RMB.

Focusing on seven priority tasks. We have broken down those tasks into specific projects.

We are going to press ahead with the implementation of the 15th Five-Year Plan and development blueprint, and translate it into high quality results. Talking about asset and liability business, we are going to focus on four strategies with better balance between scale and quality.

First of all, continue to optimize asset and liability structure. On the asset side, we will strengthen the varieties, the industry targets, and the duration management of loans while focusing on the five tasks and loan support for key industries and sectors.

We will give a better play to loan investment in our asset allocation with the right scale and issuance tempo. On liabilities, we are going to focus on payroll services, fast payment to third party custodian, cash management, and other key products and services.

We are going to expand sources of low cost funding while optimizing deposit structures and lowering, optimizing our liabilities cost. Secondly, we are going to strengthen our capabilities of value creation with comprehensive coverage of different modalities of a financial industry.

We are going to transform our revenue structure by sparing no effort to develop payment settlement, treasury management, bond underwriting, global custodian services, and agency trading. We will go all out to expand the non-interest revenue.

Thirdly, we are going to expand our global footprint and the strengths. We will continue to optimize our global footprint and the service mechanisms, while further enhancing profit contribution from overseas institutions.

We are going to further help with internationalization of the RMB, helping Chinese companies go global, and help create benchmark brands for Chinese companies going global. We are going to provide comprehensive financial services for our clients in the overseas market.

And we will continue to enhance financial market business activities. Number four, we will continue to solidify risk management and compliance management with comprehensive capabilities and deployment.

We are further strengthening our look-through risk management and compliance capabilities, especially in terms of key sectors and business areas, so as to ensure the overall stability of our asset quality. At the same time, we will continue to provide for forward-looking judgment analysis for market risk and liquidity risk, et cetera.

I hope that would answer your question about our asset and liability management and our implementation on the 15th Five-Year Plan.

Thank you, President Zhang. Next question please.

The gentleman from the second row.

Thank you. I am from CICC, Lin Chi by name.

Over the past several quarters, we could see that BOC's NIM has continued to stabilize. Could you help analyze the drivers?

How do we identify the short-term impact and the long-term impact for the second half of 2026? What are the sources of pressure and support, respectively, for the NIM development?

There are greater expectations for rate hike by the USD. What is going to be the impact on our overseas NIM and investment returns?

As I am in charge of asset and liability business, I am going to provide you with some answers. The RMB market rate is kept at a reasonable low level while key foreign currencies are observing higher interest rates.

Our global diversified currency allocation has been further brought to play. Starting from Q2 2025, we started to stabilize our NIM, and for the first half of 2026, it improved by one basis point to 1.27%.

In the shorter term, the negative impact is under control, and there has been a repricing of mature long-term deposits of the RMB. For the mid to longer term future, we have exercised comprehensive management, striking a balance between volume and price.

For the first half of this year, with reasonable targets, we are highlighting the synergy between volume and price. Domestic RMB loan maintained a flat and even growth, and also newly incurred loan deposit stabilized.

A loan interest rate stabilized marginally with yield remarkable improve as compared to the first half of the year. Also group foreign currency NIM increased a lot as compared to last year, contributing to stabilization of group NIM.

Overseas core asset maintained a faster growth, while foreign currency interest rate maintained at a relatively high level. That is why in the first half, overseas institutions loan growth are better than the previous year, and the bond investment grew faster.

While for overseas low cost capital and the fund acquisition capability are gradually enhancing in global custody, payroll services, cash management, and we are improving. Also in treasury funding agency businesses, the contribution from this business are growing, and also customer deposit interest are declining.

In the first half, overseas institutions current deposit contribution are increasing, while foreign currency deposit and loan spread marginally improved. Overseas institution operation mainly rely on the foreign currency NIM, and it is higher than domestic RMB NIM.

In terms of pressure, the RMB new loans interest rate are stabilizing. However, when credit are slowing down and the quality are improving, the overall asset yield is under pressure.

On the supporting factors, RMB liability cost are reducing, and we will gradually control the high cost deposit by volume and by price, and continuously optimize the deposit structure. In the latter half of the year, we will continuously lower our deposit cost.

On asset side, we will optimize the asset structure, and high yield businesses will gradually grow. Risk-based pricing capability enhancement will further enhance our asset yield.

Foreign currency NIM contribution will continue. Foreign currency asset percentage of the bank is rather high with foreign currency NIM are higher than RMB NIM.

The U.S. dollar interest rate may be uncertain in the near term, and we are confident that through active adjustment of asset and liability, we will continuously improve the resilience of our NIM.

Thank you. That's all for my answer to your question.

Because we have many H share analysts online, now we will invite our meeting assistant to connect friends online to ask a question.

Can you hear me now? Can you hear me?

Yes, we can hear you.

My name is [Li Lin Li] from JPMorgan Chase. My question is about non-interest income.

BOC's non-interest income performance was very stable in the first half of the year. Can management tell us the drivers of non-interest income growth?

Can you help us to analyze the features and the drivers of non-interest income by business lines and by region, and what is your prospects for the latter half of the non-interest income?

Now the floor is given to EVP Huang.

Thank you for your question. The economy of the country is stabilizing with positive foreign trade growth and also active transactions in the capital market contributing a good environment for non-interest income growth of the bank.

BOC actively promote business transaction and expand the non-interest income sources. In the first half of the year, non-interest income stabilized and improved for the better.

The non-interest income of the bank was RMB 120.38 billion, an increase of 5.04% year-on-year. The percentage of non-interest income to total income was 33.71%, mainly benefiting from settlement clearing agency sales and the financial markets performance.

In terms of the drivers, I want to list four. First, we continuously optimize the supply of high-quality financial services with a steady growth in settlement and clearing.

By the end of June, total corporate customer accounts and total corporate settlement accounts grew by 7% respectively, leading to 6.83% growth of domestic corporate settlement fee. Debit card payment amount exceed CNY 4 trillion.

Commission fee growth grew by 6.5% in this category. Cross-border RMB settlement amount, international settlement amount, e-commerce transaction amount grew by more than 20% respectively, contributing to continuous growth of corporate international settlement fee and commissions.

Second, we continuously enhance our wealth management capacity and satisfy customer demands to upgrade their asset allocation. We establish a global integrated asset allocation system and provide more products to our customer.

Agency sale, the fund, and wealth management product exceeded 7,800. Individual customer investment category financial asset grew by 7.16%.

Fund agency sale fee grew by 31%, and agency wealth management fee grew by 17% in Macau and Hong Kong. They are working hard to increase their fund agency sales income by 4.6%.

Our integrated operation companies also strengthen their fee income by interaction with headquarters, stock sales, fund, and wealth management products. We also improve our global custody service system.

We are the first Chinese bank to offer global custody service among Chinese peers, and in the first half of the year, group custody asset scale grew by 10.27%, leading to 10.29% increase of our custody business revenue. Domestic asset custody and wealth management achieved double growth with fee income grew by 12%.

Overseas custody asset, cross-border custody asset grew by 16% and 19% respectively. The scale ranks as number one among Chinese peers, leading to cross-border custody fee business grew by 13.09%.

We further leverage our strength in global financial market with a steady growth in investment and transaction business. We strengthen our professional judgment about macroeconomy and financial markets trends, effectively balance between risk and investment opportunities and provide 24/7 uninterrupted services to our customers.

Looking into future, the macroeconomy will be stable in China and the structure will be better. In a low interest rate environment, wealth management need will be further released.

We will continuously consolidate the foundation for non-interest business, since domestic and overseas opportunities rely on domestic operation and create international global synergy to maintain the contribution of non-interest income to total revenue amid low interest environment. We will steadily enhance payment and settlement business.

This is the cornerstone of our non-interest income. We will further expand our leadership in international settlement, cross-border RMB settlement, and also promote faster payment and credit card business enhancement so as to lay a solid foundation for non-interest income.

Second, we will further expand wealth management, asset management custody services. The customer have a need to upgrade their asset allocation and allocate more to wealth management, asset management products.

We will rely on our global advantage and channel resources, expand agency sale of fund insurance products, wealth management products, and precious metal products. Rely on asset custody and wealth management capability, we will further enhance the contribution from wealth management and asset management.

Third, we will continue to enhance our competitiveness in financial market amid market volatility. We will further enhance our client driven transaction business revenue.

We will strengthen market assessment and strengthen active management of bond holdings and enhance business synergy for bond investment businesses so as to generate more non-interest income.

Thank you. Now we welcome more questions.

Thank you for giving me this opportunity. My name is Claire Ouyang from Goldman.

I have a question about globalization of the bank. The global competitiveness of the bank is further consolidated in the first half of the year.

Looking into the latter half of the year, under the 15th Five-Year Plan period, what are the opportunities of the back half in global operation, and how can you turn this advantage into profitability?

Recently, we hold a company day in Shenzhen to further expand our globalization. Globalization is within the gene of BOC and also the strength of the bank in our past 100 years of operation.

In recent years, global operation of the bank further strengthened and contribute to our income amid low interest environment. In the first half of the year, we found three highlights.

First, financial contribution maintained at high level in the first half of 2026. Overseas net profit, $6.4 billion, contributing to 27.21% of total group net profit.

ROE and cost income ratio are better than domestic performance and overseas NIM increased by five basis point quarter-on-quarter, 11 basis point year-on-year. Supporting the stabilization of group name.

Second, maintain high quality growth in various businesses. Overseas asset scale exceeded $1.34 trillion, up 5.67% YoY, and loan grew by $26.1 billion, up.

The growth rate was 5.82%. Asset quality was stable.

At the end of June, overseas non-performing loan amount, NPL ratio, reduced by CNY 5.3 billion and 0.2 percentage points respectively. In Hong Kong and Macau, the NPL ratio was better than peers.

Looking into the latter half and the next five years, there are many Chinese companies going global and they are more influential globally. During the 15th Five-Year Plan period, BOC will continuously take globalization as our priority and turn our globalization advantage into profit growth.

During the 15th Five-Year Plan period, we will continue to maintain overseas business contribution to the group, and the contribution rate of overseas institution in terms of net profit will make new breakthroughs. In the following aspects, first, in the forward-looking way, we are going to make global arrangements for assets and liability.

Now our overseas assets exceeded $1 trillion, accounting for 22% of our total assets. With interest spread between RMB and foreign currencies, we are carrying out cross-border asset allocation to play hedging roles on the asset side.

Our overseas institution loans and bond business continue to grow on liabilities. Current savings are accounting for a bigger share in the deposit structure for our overseas institutions with lower cost.

We have put in place leading amongst Chinese peers, group wide funding pool for global allocation. At the same time, we will continue to strengthen interest rate and exchange rate risk management by optimizing business structure, giving full play to the interest spread between RMB and foreign currency, and assisting high quality development of asset liability development for overseas.

Secondly, we are going to further leverage global network and infrastructure while enhancing non-interest business competitiveness. For international financial institutions, the G20 members, five countries of the BRIC, 10 ASEAN countries, and APEC members, we have achieved complete coverage.

Our payment and clearing network has covered 60 countries and regions. Our RMB, a number of RMB clearing banks is number one amongst our peers, is the only LCH designated PPS settlement bank and the first Chinese member.

Our global custodian service covered 100 plus countries and regions with extensive infrastructure and layout. It is one of our unique advantages, able to provide a complete suite of products and services.

In terms of financial markets business, we are going to further expand customer driven trading and global custodian services so as to further add up to contribution of these business lines. Thirdly, we are going to drive up further synergies between domestic and overseas business by giving full play to our global services for our 37 domestic branches.

They are also important bonds for global connections such as Shanghai International Financial Center and Hainan Free Trade Port, and the Hong Kong, Macau and Guangdong Greater Bay Area deployments. It will help us further enhance our comprehensive revenue.

Thanks to the above mentioned three pathways, we are going to turn global opportunities into concrete financial returns and shareholder value. Thank you.

Now let's go back to the on-site Q&A. Next question.

The lady from the left, from the first row.

Thank you for giving me this opportunity. I am from CITIC Securities, Xiao Feifei by name.

I would like to congratulate BOC on your business performance. I have a question about asset quality for the first half.

There has been a very good asset quality. The question for management is what are your views on sector specific risks?

What about the provision levels for the entire year?

Thank you, Ms. Analyst Xiao from CITIC Securities.

EVP Wu Jian, please handle this question.

Thank you for your question. It is fair to say that since the beginning of 2026, confronted with the complex changes at home and abroad, the Chinese economy has displayed a development momentum of overall stability and trends towards new sectors and higher quality development.

In this process, we have carried out proactive management of credit risks with even more effective measures. We have further enhanced refined management measures, and the collection and resolution quality has been better and higher.

For risk management for the first half, the results have been good, resulting in overall stability in asset quality. By the end of June this year, the NPL ratio stood at 1.22%, 0.01% lower than that of end of last year, continuing to stay at a low level.

For overseas institutions, the NPL ratio and NPL balance both dropped. Our provision coverage ratio exceeds 200%.

Therefore, our risk resilience capabilities and preparations are adequate and reasonable. If I take a look at the sources of pressure for risk management, there are three of them.

First, domestic individual business or personal banking business will continue to pay attention to personal loans as a quality evolution, with strengthened management of overdue and NPL management. Second, for domestic corporate business, we will do a better job in forecasting risk developments so as to press ahead with the risk resolution in an orderly way.

Thirdly, our overseas business will continue to strengthen risk analysis response and resolution in key areas and sectors while continuing to solidify our global advantages. Looking forward to the second half of 2026, despite persistent complexities in external environment, the Chinese economy will continue to grow in a stable way with further improvement.

In this context, the Bank of China will continue to balance between development and security by strengthening risk analysis and guarding the bottom line of no systemic financial risks. We will continue to optimize the loan structure while further support the infrastructure development and higher level openness.

Second, we will be very stringent with the bottom line of asset quality by controlling incremental growth and optimizing existing stock of a business. We will focus on key business lines, key areas, and key sectors and key customers with forward-looking identification, proactive management, and precision resolution.

We will continue to adhere to the principle of prudential provision making. Thirdly, we are going to strengthen intelligent and smart capabilities in risk management by leveraging data-driven technologies and other new technologies.

With technology empowerment, we are better able to identify risks with early warning and resolution, making risk management more effective. Number four, we will continue to focus on key areas and sectors in terms of overseas business risks.

In particular, we will pay attention to over-concentration of loan expansion in overseas business so as to ensure overall quality and stability of asset quality for our overseas business. We have every confidence in maintaining a stable asset quality throughout 2026, with adequate risk provision and compensation capabilities.

In the interest of time, so much for questions from investors and analysts. If you have any further questions, please talk to investor relationship management department.

Now, let me hand back to Yu Ke, our spokesperson for Q&A by media friends.

Thank you, President Mr. Liu.

I am spokesperson Yu Ke for Bank of China. I would like to welcome all of you to our press conference.

With the golden autumn around the corner, we are scaling new heights in our stable development. I would like to thank all of you for your consistent support and interest.

We are going to leverage this opportunity to conduct an effective Q&A. Now, before asking your question, please identify yourself with your name and press affiliation.

The lady from the first row, please.

Hello. Hello.

I am from Xinhua. Tech finance is one of the five priorities for financial sector in China, as well as a key sector for BOC.

At the beginning of our 15th Five-Year Plan in tech finance, what are going to be the breakthroughs and what are going to be the future plans?

Thank you, journalist from Xinhua. President Zhang Hui, I am giving the floor to you.

Thank you for your interest for tech finance by Bank of China. Tech finance is one of our long-term business priorities.

For the first half of this year, we continue to register positive results. By the end of June, tech finance accounted for 1/3 of corporate loans.

We have provided tech loan support for over 200,000 companies. At the beginning of year, according to the National 15th Five-Year Plan, and during the next five-year period we would focus on modern industry system and the high level tech development amongst a total of 12 strategic priorities.

According to BOC's 15th Five-Year Plan adopted this morning by the board, tech finance will continue to be leveraged as an important driver for us to optimize our business while supporting national priorities. It has further highlighted tech finance role in BOC within the next five years.

We will continue to give play to full cycle customer service capabilities and a full stack product support. We are going to deploy tech-enabled risk management capabilities as well.

Thanks to the development of those strategies and the structures, it will assist in higher level tech development by ourselves. We are going to focus on three aspects.

First, for industrial layout, we are going to expand from standalone developments to industry-wide coverage. Industrial chain by industrial chain, we are going to establish a paradigm of one chain, one strategy, and one plan, so that standalone solutions we are going to join dots into lines.

This effort has already been rolled out. Starting from the beginning of 2025, amongst our peers, we were the first to roll out our AI industrial chain action plan, covering the foundational layer, innovation layer, and application layer of AI and industry.

We are supporting 5,200 companies of this kind with RMB 660 billion of loan support. For biopharma and commercial space industry, we have regarded them of the key industry to enjoy our support.

We are constantly enhance our capabilities in this regard. In tandem with the national strategies, we will further refine our strategies for sector specific support.

We are going to give further play to our global footprint, following tech companies in their global presence and expansion. That is going to be our next step of focus in supporting this sector.

Second, we will continue to focus on the iterative process of our products. On the one hand, we should better serve the full life cycle requirements of tech companies based on their early and midterm trials, commercialization, and global expansion, as well as the need to provide services for tech talents.

BOC will establish complete suite of products to support all those six stages or imperatives. In this way, our support for tech companies is more precise and stage specific.

For example, we are offering sci-tech innovation loans and loans for new and special industries and sectors as well as guarantee loans for individual entrepreneurship. On the other hand, AI, we have rolled out BOC Sci-Tech Innovation Computing Power Loan.

We have also rolled out the BD loan, new and excellent quality catalog loan and centralized sourcing loan for pharma and pharmaceutical and other companies. During the 15th Five-Year Plan, we are going to offer a full stack products in order for our customers to enjoy tailor-made and precise services.

Across the different services and products, we are going to provide better connections so that our products and services will accompany our clients throughout their life cycle. Thirdly, we are going to focus on collaborative ecosystem.

For sci-tech and innovation companies, they need not only loans. They have a need for bonds, equity, and insurance products as well.

BOC in line with the needs of these tech companies, we are focusing on establish a financial services ecosystem to achieve a multi win. We are strengthening group-wide interaction and synergy.

At the end of last year, we have issued a plan to provide group-wide services to our customers. We try to achieve a synergy between bond, loans, and insurance and the leasing so as to provide multi-sector services to our customer.

This ecosystem have been established for 40 projects and covering quantum computing and AI. On the other hand, we continuously expand the ecosystem of a corporation, continuously strengthen our cooperation with different local and government promoting fund, working together with different sectors to gather resources from various sectors to contribute to the development of tech sector.

Under the BOC Tech Innovation Ecosystem Partnership, we have organized seven activities, attracting 2,800 companies and 5,000 investment institutions to attend such activities. We will further expand the connotation and the externality of such ecosystem so as to provide a long-term companionship to tech companies, better help the growth of tech companies.

Thank you. That's all for my response.

Thank you, President Zhang. Now we allow further questions.

First row, on the left side.

Thank you for giving me this opportunity. I'm from Hong Kong Commercial Daily.

I'm very happy to attend this press release on occasion of 20 years anniversary of dual listing of BOC in A and H share. I want to ask a question.

What kind of competitive and comprehensive financial services will be provided by BOC for companies going global and cross-border presence?

Thank you for your question. I want to give the floor to President Zhang Hui.

I will answer your question. At present, Chinese companies going global are changing their business models and features of overseas investing.

How can we better serve Chinese companies going global is an important responsibility of BOC. BOC will provide integrated financial services to companies going global in four aspects.

First, we will further consolidate our advantage and lay a solid foundation for providing diversified products to our customers. Globalization is our distinctive feature, and our global layout is the foundation for serving companies going global.

Our global services network are further expanded. We have served about 530,000 companies in overseas market, and also we have enhanced interaction between commercial banks and non-bank financial subsidiaries, and providing insurance, bond, loan, and leasing services in an integrated manner.

Cross-border financial services capability of the bank are continuously enhanced. Second, we will focus on the pain points of companies going global, helping them to address their bottlenecks.

Chinese companies going global are shifting from commodity sales to technology transfer and capital investment, and they have local operation and digital management as well. BOC will seize this opportunity, optimize our services, and help Chinese companies going global in cross-border payment and settlement, and we will help them to increase the efficiency of payment.

The listed currency pairs reached 45, and we can provide foreign currency services for 100 currencies. For Zambia, Mauritius, and other small local currencies, we also provide services.

We are improving smart middle office services and try to improve the efficiency of services provided for Chinese companies going global. In the past, account opening was slow, and now we provide easy account opening services for Chinese companies going global.

With domestic application, they can open their overseas account in BOC. We have seven by 24 clearance services.

Multi-currency fund transfer can arrive your account within seconds. We help the companies to address the exchange rate risk and the interest rate risk, and helping them to come up with hedging solutions.

We provide derivative products in 90 currencies. For long-term project financing needs of the companies, we provide multi-currency loans at the maximum 30 years of maturity, so as to provide controllability and stability of funding for major projects.

Third, we have targeted empowerment of companies. Previously, BOC worked together with relevant entities to provide 1,300 Chinese companies going global with our questionnaire to ask their needs.

We summarize their most urgent needs. Based on this questionnaire, we set up a sailing and long-term shipping by name to service solutions.

On August 27th, we launched our service solution in Shenzhen to the public. We look at the different stage of needs of the customer provider, differentiated services to them.

For a launch product, we target companies going global for the first time. We also have a long voyage service solution targeting companies who have been in overseas market for many years.

Second, we focused on the major industries with global expansion of Chinese companies. For different industry and a different country, we come up with specific solutions.

For e-commerce, building, automobile, and in total, 10 key industries and 10 major countries, including Indonesia and Brazil. We have provided country-specific service guideline.

Fourth, we gather resources to set up ecosystem for providing services to financial market. We work together with COSCO and China Merchants Bank Group, and The Export-Import Bank of China, and CICC and King & Wood Mallesons law firms and Lixin accounting firm.

We work together to establish global service alliance, gathering specialties in finance, logistic, law, accounting, and think tank. In this way, we can help companies going global with better policy otherwise, legal compliance, project matching, and financial services as well.

We can provide them with one-stop services. BOC will rely on our one-point access global response mechanism to support Chinese companies going global in an end-to-end manner.

Leverage our unique advantage of global presence to empower Chinese companies' global development and to enable them to make new breakthroughs. Thank you for your question.

Thank you, President Zhang. Now we allow further questions.

The second row, the lady in the middle.

I'm a journalist from 21st Century Business Herald. My question is about consumption.

The recent Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee meeting stressed the need to expand the domestic demand. What are the achievements made by BOC in the first half in expanding domestic consumption, and what are the measures adopted by the bank to support service consumption?

Thank you for your question. The floor is given to Mr.

Cai, EVP.

Thank you for your question. BOC steadfastly implement the strategic deployment of the country in expanding domestic consumption.

We focus on the needs of different customer groups and provide them with targeted services. We have made solid progress in satisfying citizens' diversified need, while contributing to citizens' revenue boosting and enhancing their consumption capacity.

In the first half of the year, we offered RMB 390 billion loans to stabilize employment and expand employment. Second, we further enhance the citizens' property-based revenue.

We are working together with partners to create mutual fund smart investment brand. By the end of June, the total individual account financial asset exceeded CNY 18 trillion group wide.

In line with the consumption upgrading trend, we strengthen supply side support and provide more credit support in major consumption areas. In the first half, corporate credit balance in consumption area increased by 7.7%.

For cultural tourism, elderly care industry, the loan balance grew by 10%, 50% respectively. For service sector, we provide loan subsidy, and in total, the new loans to this sector exceeded CNY 640 billion.

By the end of June, 3.28 million of the customer have enjoyed installment interest subsidy. We also create a new brand of BOC beneficial tourism covering 30 provinces and cities.

In 108 cities, in 700 food district, we provide credit card consumption discount. In the first half, the marketing activity has led to a consumption of more than RMB 4 trillion.

We leverage our cross-border advantage to serve inbound consumption. We create outbound tax refund brand.

By the end of June, our tax refunds cover 25 provinces and administrative regions, and the number of tax refunds grew by 400%. We also provide more convenience for inbound consumption, and we provide merchant card acquiring businesses covering major merchants, and foreign card acquiring businesses increased by 64%.

In the next step, we will work harder to contribute to boosting consumption. We will continue to strengthen asset allocation with a higher return on investment.

Second, we are going to strengthen our credit support so as to optimize consumer finance services by unleashing more potentials for consumption. Thirdly, we are going to further optimize the environment for consumption with a host of preferential treatment or benefits for using BOC.

Number four, we are going to step up synergy with the policy community so that the fiscal interest subsidies are in place.

Next question, the lady from the second row.

Thank you. I am from Securities Daily, Yang Jie by name.

For the first half of this year, in domestic bond underwriting, it exceeded RMB 700 billion, and for Panda bond underwriting, it accounts for 66% of the percent. For 12 years, you were number one.

With changing global interest rate environment and the speeding internationalization of RMB, how will BOC further consolidate your leading edge in bond underwriting business?

VP Liu, please answer this question.

Thank you for your question. Starting from this year, the financing structure in China is undergoing profound changes and the global interest environment continues to change.

The Chinese bond market has accelerated in development, especially RMB bonds. There are good opportunities, and BOC is continuing to improve upon our business structure of bonds, making it a new cutting edge for BOC in five aspects.

First, in a forward-looking way, we are grasping trends in the market with strategic guidance. For the first half of this year, for non-financial companies, the direct financing accounts for 11.3%, 5.6 percentage points higher for the first half of this year.

The size of bond underwriting exceeded RMB 750 billion, serving over 300 issuers. For the first half of this year, our bond business grew by over 30%.

We have a dedicated plan for bond issuance and underwriting as part and parcel of our strategy. Second, we are enabling an integrated service mechanism covering commercial banking and investment banking, while making use of diversified products such as loans, bonds, and securitization to provide a one-stop service for our customers in a close-loop model of service.

In particular, one of our biggest strengths is our global service capabilities, especially in overseas market. Cross-border RMB services has been one of our exemplary products.

For Panda bond underwriting, for 12 years on a row, we are number one for dim sum debt overseas. For three years, we have maintained a very good position.

For example, for the first half of this year, we underwrote 58 Panda bonds amounting to RMB 38 billion. For example, in Samruk-Kazyna of Kazakhstan, it is an SWF Panda bond.

For the Slovenian issue, it was the biggest issue of a Panda bond. In Pakistan, we achieved the first Panda bond underwriting in South Asia.

We were master underwriters for 140 bonds amounting to RMB 90.1 billion, accounting for 50% of the market share in dim sum debt, such as the first dim sum debt by Singapore Airlines and a RMB 31.1 billion and euro double currency bond issued by SWF Indonesia. From bond issuance, to market trading, to asset allocation, to interest rate and exchange rate risk management, we are offering a one-stop service.

We jointly issued first cross-border RMB bond white paper together with ICMA. Secondly, we are expanding on innovative practices in the bond market, focusing on the five key priorities of the financial sector with multiple cases of innovation.

For example, for science innovation bond, we helped issue first POE, a private company offered M&A bond. In terms of green finance for the first half of this year, we underwrote over RMB 58 billion of ESG financing.

For example, we took the lead in helping Guangdong provincial government issue their offshore RMB green bond and blue bond. In pension finance, we helped with the first pension-specific bond issues.

We have always kept risk management compliance in mind with the right checks and balances. We will continue to focus on the national 15th Five-Year Plan with multiple layers of bond market in development, in tandem with internationalization of the RMB.

We are going to give full play to our capabilities to further enhance and strengthen our leading edge in bond underwriting business going forward. Thank you for your question.

Thank you, Mr. Liu.

We have the last opportunity. Last question.

Lady from the third row, please.

Hello. I am from Tencent Finance, Jun Ping by name.

My question is about AI. So far, AI is reshaping the way banks are doing business.

I want to ask what BOC is doing in AI empowerment and efficiency enhancement, and in the digital intelligent transformation going forward. What are going to be BOC's plans?

Vice President Cai Zhao, please answer this question.

Thank you for your question. In 2026, BOC is earnestly implementing the decisions of the central government with the right balance between development and security, and an in-depth implementation of AI deployment as required by regulators.

We have issued AI Plus plan and AI Plus finance implementation plan with the 3-2-6 architecture first. We are building a foundational level serving the entire group with the unified computing power platform and BOC AI large language models platform.

Leveraging three information centers overseas and our global footprint, we are helping branches with computing power, model selection, and risk management. Second, we are enabling full service scenario deployments driven by value.

With the convergence between business and technology, we have incubated over 2,000 intelligent assistants, and we are implementing a roadmap of joining dots with skilled development and applications covering smart sales and point of sales Q&A, and other capabilities covering various business sectors and modalities such as customer service, sales, credit business, risk management, and operations covering the front office, middle office, and back office. For example, take credit business, for example, from pre-loan reporting to mid-loan due diligence to post-loan data analysis.

It's a full process intelligence support. In Singapore and other branches, we are piloting with global business development empowered by AI for loan extension.

Thirdly, we are establishing a security governance mechanism with both security and development with ex-ante assessment, standardized tagging, content testing, and human checks and balances. Going forward, BOC will continue to implement the 15th Five-Year Plan, AI Plus plan, et cetera.

First, we're going to further solidify the foundation of technology with self-reliance, intelligent computing platforms, the large model platforms, and agent platform. Second, we're going to be more business-focused with re-engineering of business processes in order to reap more business benefits and value.

On the business side, we're going to focus on high-level scenarios. On the technology side, with greater R&D, we are leveraging technology to empower an agile ecosystem of coordination between data and business.

Thirdly, we're going to always focus on security. AI risk management has been incorporated in the overall structure of risk management with self-iterative process and self-growth.

In this way, AI is being applied in a compliant way, and AI for good is the principle ensured.

In the interest of time, so much for Q&A. If you have further questions to ask, please contact us.