Two years ago, Bank of Suzhou held a strategic planning meeting for 2024 to 2026. Chairman Cui Qingjun emphasized that the new strategic plan was independently developed based on the bank’s current development needs.
From the beginning of Cui Qingjun’s leadership, Bank of Suzhou set a clear timeline for its "Trillion-Yuan Suzhou Bank" goal. The target was to expand the bank’s total assets from 601.8 billion yuan at the end of 2023 to one trillion yuan within three years (2024–2026). To achieve this, the bank would need an annual asset growth rate of at least 22%.
Recent board meeting resolutions approved revisions to the Bank of Suzhou’s 2024–2026 strategic plan, though specific details remain undisclosed.
By the end of 2024, Bank of Suzhou’s total assets reached 693.804 billion yuan, a 15.28% year-on-year increase. As of the first three quarters of 2025, total assets grew to 776.040 billion yuan, up 82.326 billion yuan (11.87%) from the beginning of the year. Despite maintaining double-digit growth, the pace has slowed, indicating a challenging path ahead to reach the trillion-yuan target.
As a top-performing city commercial bank, Bank of Suzhou faces multiple challenges.
**1. Slowing Profit Growth** Revenue growth has been inconsistent, while net profit attributable to shareholders has gradually decelerated. In the first nine months of 2025, Bank of Suzhou reported revenue of 9.477 billion yuan, up 2.02% year-on-year, and net profit of 4.477 billion yuan, a 7.12% increase. Comparatively, from 2022 to 2024, revenue growth was 8.62%, 0.88%, and 3.01%, while net profit growth was 26.13%, 17.41%, and 10.16%, showing a narrowing trend.
The bank has been cutting operating expenses. In the first three quarters of 2025, operating costs fell by 163 million yuan (-3.97%) to 3.937 billion yuan, with business and administrative expenses dropping 8.71% to 2.965 billion yuan.
**2. Decline in Personal Loans** As of Q3 2025, Bank of Suzhou’s total loans and advances stood at 356.224 billion yuan, up 11.15% from the start of the year. Corporate loans rose 16.7% to 281.82 billion yuan, while personal loans fell 5.6% to 86.73 billion yuan.
Interim reports showed that in the first half of 2025, personal banking assets declined 3.54% year-on-year to 103.652 billion yuan, with total profits down 30.74% to 374 million yuan.
Additionally, while Bank of Suzhou maintains a high loan loss provision coverage ratio, it has been declining—from 530.81% in 2022 to 420.59% by Q3 2025.
**Shareholder Impact** Recently, major shareholder Guofa Group announced plans to increase its stake by at least 400 million yuan, boosting market confidence. However, concerns remain as another shareholder, Suzhou Haijing Information Technology Group, had its entire 11.0028 million shares (0.25% of total equity) frozen, including 11 million pledged shares subject to judicial re-freezing.
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