Others News
- ABC plans to double credit cards by year end
Date: 17-Sep-2007 Sources: (Xinhua Online)
BEIJING, Sept. 14 -- Agricultural Bank of China plans to nearly double the number of credit cards it has in circulation by the end of this year by launching more products amid the nascent but competitive credit card market in China.
The Beijing-based bank aims to have three million credit cards in circulation at the end of this year, up from the current 1.5 million cards, an unnamed bank official told Shanghai Daily.
The bank's credit-driven cards will top eight million in the same period, including pro-credit cards, on which interest will be calculated instantly when card holder rolls over the bill.
On regular credit cards, there is normally a 60-day interest-free period.
The bank has about 4.5 million pro-credit cards in circulation now.
Agricultural Bank set up its credit card center in Beijing in 2003 as a late entrant into the market. The bank shifted the center to Shanghai in November to provide quicker response to market demand.
The bank was the last among the big-four state owned banks to step onto a restructuring path. It is going all out to strengthen its product line to fight with rivals. The bank introduced cards targeting university students to build its client pool recently.
Banks including Industrial Bank, Shanghai Pudong Development Bank, Bank of Shanghai and China Merchants Bank have already set up their credit card centers in Shanghai.
More than 50 million credit cards have been issued in China so far. Credit cards will be the most important consumer credit product after mortgages, with profit gained of up to 1.6 billion U.S. dollars by 2013, accounting for 22 percent of total consuming credit profits, McKinsey & Consulting said earlier.
A survey by the Economist Intelligence Unit and First Data International on 152 respondents also found global bank executives consider China's credit card business promising though no quick profits can be made.
Overseas players like Standard Chartered Bank and Bank of East Asia have also applied to issue their own credit cards on the Chinese mainland.
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