Bank Wealth Management Products' "Performance Benchmark" Drops Over 50%; Average Returns Below 2% in 2025

Performance benchmarks, which investors view as an important reference for expected returns on wealth management products, have recently undergone a series of adjustments.

Since 2026, more than a dozen bank wealth management subsidiaries have issued announcements regarding adjustments to their product performance benchmarks, involving hundreds of products.

On one hand, some products’ performance benchmarks have been lowered, with the upper limit of the benchmark for some wealth management products reduced by over 50%. Based on the adjusted benchmarks, most products now have an upper limit below 3%.

On the other hand, the benchmarks have shifted from fixed values or fixed ranges to being linked to indices. As market conditions drive index changes, the performance benchmarks of wealth management products will also be adjusted accordingly.

Industry analysts note that this round of adjustments is a positive response to regulatory guidance and industry standards. In the context of declining asset yields, such adjustments help align benchmarks more closely with the essence of net asset value-based operations of wealth management products. In the short term, more wealth management firms are expected to follow suit and lower their benchmarks.

Some products’ benchmarks have been cut by 50%

Since 2026, over ten wealth management companies, including ABC Wealth Management, China Post Wealth Management, China Merchants Bank Wealth Management, Shanghai Silver Wealth Management, Everbright Wealth Management, Hengfeng Wealth Management, Bank of Communications Wealth Management, Xingye Wealth Management, Huaxia Wealth Management, Minsheng Wealth Management, and Ping An Wealth Management, have announced adjustments to their product benchmarks.

Overall, the upper limits of the adjusted benchmarks for these products are now mostly below 3%.

For example, Hengfeng Wealth Management’s one-and-a-half-year fixed-term wealth management product had its benchmark lowered from 4.25%-4.75% to the “1-year fixed deposit rate published by the People’s Bank of China + 0.85%” (i.e., 2.35%). Compared to the previous upper limit, this is a 51% reduction.

Minsheng Wealth Management adjusted the benchmark of a two-year fixed-income enhanced wealth management product from 4.0%-6.0% to 2.6%-3.1%, a 35% decrease in the upper limit and a 48% decrease in the lower limit.

ABC Wealth Management lowered the benchmark of its 7-day wealth management product from 2.20%-3.20% to 1.70%-2.20%, a 23% reduction in the upper limit and a 31% reduction in the lower limit.

Data from Puyi Standard also shows that as of February 2026, the average benchmarks of on-sale products have declined compared to January: fixed income products’ average benchmark decreased by 1 basis point to approximately 2.18%, and mixed products’ average benchmark decreased by 3 basis points to about 2.99%.

In addition to lowering benchmarks, some wealth management firms are adjusting from fixed values or ranges to benchmarks linked to market indices, such as the ChinaBond index or the 7-day reverse repurchase rate of the People’s Bank of China.

For example, Everbright Wealth Management changed the benchmark of a six-month product from a fixed 1.80% to the “CBA00113.CS - ChinaBond New Composite Full Price (less than 1 year) index yield.”

Bank of Communications Wealth Management adjusted a 30-day fixed-income product’s benchmark from “2.00%-3.70% (annualized)” to “30% of the People’s Bank of China’s published savings deposit rate + 70% of the ChinaBond 0-3 months Treasury bond index yield.”

Some firms are also linking benchmarks to relatively stable rates such as the People’s Bank of China’s 7-day notice deposit rate or the 1-year fixed deposit rate.

On March 12, reporters from Huaxia Times inquired with several wealth management firms about these adjustments, but no official responses had been received as of press time.

More standardized performance benchmarks

Performance benchmarks are an important reference for investors when choosing wealth management products. To attract investors, some firms previously engaged in “ranking” yields—showing returns through “shell products” and adjusting yields on newly issued or very small-scale products to appear more attractive, sometimes presenting higher annualized returns. After investors entered and product scales expanded rapidly, these yields quickly fell back to normal levels.

To regulate such practices, in December 2025, the State Financial Supervision and Administration issued the “Measures for the Disclosure of Asset Management Product Information” (the “Measures”). Regarding performance benchmarks, the Measures require that the disclosure of past performance should follow principles of stability and internal logical consistency, prohibiting arbitrary changes to disclosure rules, selective disclosure of certain periods to exaggerate past performance, or applying different disclosure rules to similar products. Additionally, product managers should maintain the continuity of performance benchmarks and generally avoid adjusting them.

Shanghai Financial and Development Laboratory chief expert Zeng Gang believes that regulators are explicitly focusing on the “achievement rate”—the proportion of actual returns outperforming the benchmark—which directly encourages institutions to lower benchmarks to improve the “achievement” probability. Instead of passively lagging behind, it is better to proactively lower benchmarks to achievable levels.

He also pointed out that changing benchmarks from fixed values or ranges to market-linked indices like the ChinaBond index or the deposit rate represents a deeper paradigm shift. For example, the new benchmark of Bank of Communications Wealth Management will float with market interest rates, reducing operational costs associated with frequent manual adjustments and breaking the psychological expectation of “implicit rigid guarantees” among investors. This marks a significant step toward true “net value” and “market-oriented” operations in the wealth management industry after years of implementation of new asset management regulations.

In addition to regulatory considerations, the average yields of wealth management products in 2025 are also a factor.

According to the China Wealth Management Market Annual Report (2025) published by China Wealth Management Network, the average yield of wealth management products in 2025 was 1.98%, down 0.67 percentage points from 2.65% in 2024.

Data from Puyi Standard shows that as of the end of February 2026, the one-month annualized yield of cash management products was 1.25%, a slight decline from the previous month; the overall average one-month annualized yield of fixed income products was 2.16%, down 146 basis points; the average yields of mixed and equity products were 1.30% and 5.83%, respectively, with overall significant declines.

Zeng Gang told reporters, “In the context of declining deposit rates and bond yields at low levels, the actual performance of wealth management products has diverged significantly from the previous benchmarks of 3%-5%. Continuing to maintain high benchmarks not only results in low ‘achievement rates’ but may also cause misunderstandings or disputes among investors.” In this situation, lowering benchmarks is an active acknowledgment by wealth management firms of current realities.

“Short-term, more firms are expected to follow suit and lower their benchmarks,” said Puyi Standard researcher Zhang Qiaozhu to Huaxia Times. He believes that the current low-interest-rate environment and loose liquidity conditions will likely persist in the short term, with bond yields remaining low, putting ongoing pressure on investment returns for wealth management firms. Additionally, some existing products’ benchmarks still deviate from actual operational yields, leaving room for further optimization and adjustment.