The EUR/USD and XAU/USD pairs continue to dominate underlying exposure in the country’s retail structured deposits market.
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The SRP database registered 1,230 retail structured deposits issued in January, up from 883 during the same time a year ago.
The latest issuance also outpaced the previous month when 1,162 products were launched.
China: monthly issuance of retail structured deposits between Jan 2024 and Jan 2025
Source: SRP
Underlying, payoff
The EUR/USD pair beat December’s winner, the XAU/USD pair, becoming the most-favoured underlying in January’s league table. Around 38% of the total issuance, or 464 products, were linked to the EUR/USD pair last month.
Gold-related products also remained strong as local investors looked to capitalise on the commodity’s rally, with XAU/USD-linked products ranking second (280 products) and products linked to the price of gold solely coming in third (97).
Digital, digital range and accrual range were among the popular payoffs deployed by products using gold in the underlying.
The SPDR Gold Shares ETF was another gold asset issuers consistently tapped into, with one digital range product issued by The Bank of East Asia and one twin-win puttable capital protection with knock-out payoff manufactured by HSBC Bank (China).
China: retail structured deposits - top 10 underlyings by issuance in Jan 2025
Source: SRP
Among the top underlyings, the CSI Smallcap 500 Index and the AUD/USD pair were traded across 83 products each in January.
Other popular foreign exchange (FX) structures include the GBP/USD pair with 44 issuances and the USD/JPY with 30 new products launched.
The NYSE FANG+ Index – which includes 10 highly liquid stocks that represent the top tech and internet/media companies – has reemerged in the Chinese structured deposit market since last summer. The index was deployed in an HSBC Bank-issued two-year puttable capital protection product with a knock-out feature.
Other popular indices deployed during the quarter include the CSI 1000 and CSI 300 with respective issuances of 14 and nine in January.
Meanwhile, Standard Chartered Bank (China) rolled out its first individual client-facing tranche of structured deposits tracking the 30-year US treasury bond as US bond exposure gained traction in the rate cutting cycle.
Issuers
China Merchants Bank (CMB) overtook Bank of China as the largest issuer for the Chinese retail market by issuance from the prior-year period.
Some 425 products were manufactured by the Shenzhen-based commercial bank, up from 271 products year-on-year (YoY) but down from 497 products in the previous month.
China: retail structured deposits - top 10 issuers by issuance in January 2025
Source: SRP
The Chinese bank also issued 2,681 products, almost all of which were tied to FX rates, led by the XAU/USD pair (2,538 products).
Bank of China was the runner-up, with 362 issuances in January, up from 303 YoY, including the best-seller of the month. Traded on 2 January, the five-month accrual product tracked the GBP/USD pair, which collected sales of CNY9.9 billion (US$1.4 billion).
Shanghai Pudong Development Bank moved up to the top three ranking in January, with 78 product issuances, a surge from 27 products YoY.
Meanwhile, Ping An Bank and Hua Xia Bank went head to head in contention to complete the top five ranking, with 65 and 63 product issuances, respectively.
Looking ahead
Some 979 retail structured deposits in China are set to mature this month, 505 of which had reached maturity by today (17 February), with the majority being short-term FX rates products (428).
Some 1,126 structured deposits targeting institutional investors expired as of today– almost all of which were also FX rates products.
Main image: Aboodi Vesakaran
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