Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon. Welcome to the 2023 Annual Results Briefing of BOC Hong Kong Holdings Limited. I'm Kenny Law, Company Secretary of BOC HK. To begin with our result briefing, I would like to introduce the senior executives with us today: Mr. Sun Yu, Chief Executive; Mr. Liu Chenggang, Chief Financial Officer; Mr. Xu Haifeng, Deputy Chief Executive and Chief Risk Officer; Mr. Xing Guiwei, Deputy Chief Executive; Mr. Wang Huabin, Deputy Chief Executive; and Mr. Chan Man, Deputy Chief Executive; and Madam Li Tong, Deputy Chief Executive; and Mr. Stanley Yung, Chief Credit Officer. Today's meeting consists of three parts. Mr. Sun, our Chief Executive, will first provide a briefing on the implementation progress of our group's strategy in 2023. Then Mr. Liu, our Chief Financial Officer, will present our financial results.
Finally, Sun Yu will share our outlook and key priorities for 2024 before the Q&A session. Now I would like to hand over to Sun Yu. Mr. Sun, please.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon. First of all, I would like to introduce Mr. Wang Huabin and Madam Li Tong as new Deputy Chief Executives. Both of them have been with BOC Group for many years and possess extensive professional experience. With their arrival, our management team will be further strengthened. Let's extend a warm welcome to both DCEs for joining us. Now let's kick off the briefing with our strategic implementation review for 2023. Over the past year, amid a complex and ever-changing operating environment, we focused on improving earning growth, reinforcing foundations, and enhancing risk management and control. Our core businesses outperformed the market, and we achieved the highest operating profit since our listing. Profit attributable to shareholders was HKD 32.7 billion, up 26.1%. ROE increased by 2.1 percentage points to 10.6%.
To reward our shareholders, the board has proposed a final dividend of 1.145 HKD per share, including the interim dividend. The dividend per share for the full year will be 1.672 HKD, up 23.2%. Payout ratio rose 1 percentage point to 54%. We enhanced the diversity, inclusiveness, and accessibility of our financial services, creating new growth momentum while meeting the comprehensive needs of our customers. We consolidated our competitive advantages in traditional businesses such as residential mortgages, syndicated loans, and IPO main receiving bank services. Meanwhile, we capitalized on Hong Kong's border reopening to expand our cross-border business. Our cross-border individual customer base grew by more than 200,000, of which more than 70% are mid to high-end customers. With cross-border personal banking business income more than tripled, BOC Life also delivered an almost six-fold increase in its cross-border standard new premiums.
We expanded the coverage of our cash pooling business to 58 countries and regions, and refined the service capabilities of our trust and custody business. We optimized the client mix of our wealth management business, achieving about 20% growth in mid to high-end customers while almost doubling the number of new accounts opened by young customers. We continue to improve our financial market services and strengthen our status as a market maker for HKD and RMB, helping BOC Group to secure market leadership in the global offshore RMB bond underwriting businesses. Our integrated service capabilities were further strengthened with solid growth achieved by BOC Life, BOCI- Prudential, and BOC Hong Kong Asset Management. We remain deeply engaged in developing the infrastructure of the mutual market access scheme so as to meet customer demand for cross-border financial services.
The remittance amounts and customer numbers under our cross-boundary Wealth Management Connect services, including both Southbound and Northbound, surged by 3.5 times and 80%, respectively. We facilitated the full implementation of the Northbound service of Swap Connect. We also improved the quality and skill of our leading GBA products in account opening, mortgage loans, mobile payment, and insurance. Among this, the GBA account opening customer base grew strongly by 70%. We launched Innovation and Technology and Talent Financing Incentive Scheme to fully support the growth of innovative tech companies, with our customer base up by 18%. In addition, we actively supported the construction of the Northern Metropolis by formulating comprehensive financial service solutions. We further strengthened regional business integration and deepened our differentiated management model of One Branch, One Policy to boost the overall competitiveness of the Southeast Asian entities and their contribution to the group.
By promoting collaboration with BOC's entities in the Asia-Pacific region, we actively served the Belt and Road as well as Chinese enterprises going global. Focusing on major projects and key customers, we served as a financial bridge for trade flows between China and Asia. In addition, we further enhanced the RMB business capabilities of our local entities, refined our wealth management brand in the region, and enriched financial service scenarios for personal banking. During the period, our Southeast Asian entities grew their deposits and loans by 9.5% and 4.6%, respectively, while net operating income increased by 39.1%, all of which exceeded the corresponding growth rates of the group. To support the steady and prudent development of RMB internationalization, we leveraged our RMB expertise to enrich and innovate cross-border RMB application scenarios and draw fresh progress in RMB business.
Our RMB loan balance and cross-border RMB settlement volume increased by 1.82 times and 1.27 times, respectively. Our RMB clearing ability was further strengthened with the Phnom Penh branch appointed as an RMB clearing bank in Cambodia, while BOC HK headquarters, BOC Malaysia, and the Manila branch reported growth in RMB clearing volumes of 25%, 39%, and 61%, respectively. We supported the development of Hong Kong's status as an offshore RMB hub, becoming one of the first listed companies to launch the HKD-RMB Dual Counter Model. We also engaged in the pricing of the world's first RMB Yulan bond and completed the first dividend distribution denominated in RMB for an H-share company. We also launched several digital RMB experience annual events to facilitate customers' northbound and southbound consumption.
Sticking to a customer-centric approach, we focused on scenario-led, data-empowered, and intelligence-driven development, including establishing a set of digitalization indicators so as to increase our financial service capabilities in line with the demands of the digital era. We further developed scenario ecosystems based on customer needs in home purchasing, education, and health. Online mortgage applications through our Home Expert app accounted for about 60% of total mortgage applications. At the same time, BoC Pay saw 20.8% growth in customer numbers, while BoC Bill delivered 28.8% growth in settlement volume. Our vigorous efforts to optimize online services yielded results. During the period, the number of active mobile banking users grew by 19%. Mobile banking penetration in our Southeast Asian entities exceeded 70%, while our iGTB platform's transaction volume grew by 91%.
We accelerated the development of our intelligent operations and smart risk control capabilities while expanding the capacity of the regional operating center in Nanning. We fostered an innovative culture. We were deeply involved in the Hong Kong MA's e-HKD Pilot P rogramme and central bank digital currency project, successfully held various innovation competitions, and once again sponsored the BOC HK Science and Technology Innovation Prize. We stepped up our efforts in sustainable development by providing more and better green and sustainable financial products and services. We supported the transition towards low-carbon lifestyles across society. In the year, we increased the balances of our green and sustainable loans by 87%, new green deposits by 20%, and ESG bond investments by 81%. We became the first Chinese bank outside of the mainland to publicly commit to a target of achieving carbon-neutral operations by 2030. We also issued our first TCFD report.
In addition, we assisted the Hong Kong SAR government in issuing the world's first government-issued tokenized green bond and facilitated the issuance of RMB-denominated ESG bonds by the Hainan and Shenzhen governments. We participated in listing Hong Kong's first ESG-themed ETF to invest in the GBA and completed the first green RMB reverse repo transaction. During the year, as a socially responsible corporate citizen, we launched more than 80 charity projects and organized a wide range of activities for our volunteer week. We once again received the awards of Market Leader for ESG in Hong Kong and Market Leader for CSR in Hong Kong from Euromoney. In addition, we were honored with an outstanding corporate award from the Hong Kong SAR government at its Hong Kong Volunteer Award 2023. This concludes the strategic review. Next, our CFO, Mr. Liu, will walk you through our financial performance. Mr. Liu, please.
Thank you, Sun Yu. Now, let me introduce our 2023 financial performance. Amid a market trend of time deposit migration, we improved customer relationships, expanded our mid to high-end customer base, enhanced cross-border collaboration, and drove the development of our e-payment, e-collection, payroll, cash management, and cash pooling businesses so as to attract more transaction deposits. Our customer deposits increased by 5.3% to HKD 2.5 trillion, taking our market share to 15.2%. CASA ratio was 47.4%, down 4.3 percentage points from the end of 2022, but up 2 percentage points from the end of September. We continued to capitalize on opportunities in the Hong Kong, GBA, Southeast Asia, and key overseas markets. By deepening intra-group collaboration, we provided diversified financing solutions such as syndicated loans, project finance, green loans, and mortgages, while strengthening our full service capabilities.
Our customer loans grew by 3.3% to HKD 1.7 trillion, with our market share rising to 16.2%. Loans for use in Hong Kong increased by 6.9%, within which corporate and individual loans grew by 6.6% and 7.2%, respectively. Capitalizing on rising market interest rates, we proactively managed our assets and liabilities by optimizing our loans and bond investments, controlling funding costs, and steadily promoting our Southeast Asian business. Adjusted for swap impact, our NIM expanded by 27 basis points to 1.63%, with net interest income rising 29% to HKD 54.5 billion. In the fourth quarter, NIM was 1.68%, while net interest income grew by 3.5% over the previous quarter. Weak investor sentiment and spurred credit demand weighed on our investment and insurance-related fee income as well as loan commissions. As a result, our net fee income for the full year dropped by 6.5%.
On the bright side, we captured opportunities from Hong Kong's border reopening and grew our credit card and currency exchange fee income by 22% and 90%, respectively, while our trust and custody service achieved a breakthrough and grew its income by 9%. Together, these facts drove growth of 17.5% in non-credit-related traditional fee income. Focusing on the group's strategic development priorities, we optimized resource allocation, pursued low-carbon operations, and reduced operating expenses, which decreased by 2% to HKD 16.6 billion. Cost-to-income ratio fell by 5.9 percentage points to 25.4%, continuously outperforming local peers. In line with our risk bottom-line thinking, we strengthened comprehensive risk management and closely monitored the market and our customers to ensure solid asset quality and sufficient provision.
Due to the credit rating downgrade of certain mainland CRE customer loans and relief loans, our NPL ratio rose 52 basis points from the end of the previous year to 1.05%, remaining better than the market average. Credit cost was 0.38%, and total impairment allowances account for 0.87% of total loans, up 17 basis points. Our capability to withstand potential risks has been further consolidated. We continued to strengthen capital management, enhance profitability, and sensibly manage the scale of RWAs so as to increase capital returns. Due to the redemption of a $3 billion AT1 capital bond in the third quarter, our total capital ratio edged down by 0.34 percentage point to 21.2%, while our Tier 1 capital ratio stood firmly at 19%. Liquidity remained abundant, with our full-year average LCR and NSFR standing at 195% and 136%, respectively. This concludes the financial results review for 2023.
Sun Yu will now share the group's outlook and priorities for 2024. Thank you.
Thank you, CFO Liu. Looking ahead to 2024, the global economic environment remains severe while major economies' monetary policies are still uncertain, which increases the difficulties for banks' comprehensive risk management. However, we continue to see more opportunities than challenges. The Chinese mainland will further consolidate and enhance its positive economic recovery with a focus on high-quality development, while Hong Kong will continue to amass new momentum as it advances from stability to prosperity. Meanwhile, a series of development policies will be further deepened, such as Belt and Road corporations, RMB internationalization, the construction of the GBA and Hong Kong's Northern Metropolis, as well as improvements in the capacity and quality of various mutual market access schemes. This, together with the policy dividends created by the RCEP, will further reinforce and elevate Hong Kong's position as an international financial center, creating fresh opportunities for Hong Kong's banking sector.
In 2024, we will be increasingly proactive in serving the overall development agenda of the country and Hong Kong. We will strive to enhance our regional integrated and digital financial services so as to further consolidate and expand our unique advantages. We will cement the risk bottom line and strengthen our talent teams as well as our corporate culture. By solidly implementing all of our key tasks, we will seek to maintain high profitability, achieve breakthroughs in our foundations, and sharpen our risk management and control. In terms of operations, we will strive to keep outperforming the market in our core businesses, delay the impact on our net interest margin from potential interest rate cuts, diversify our income sources, and sustain cost-efficiency advantages. In terms of asset quality, we will strengthen the risk management and control and seek to gradually reduce credit costs.
Through all these efforts, we will aim to deliver solid business growth and profitability and continually create value for our shareholders, customers, employees, and all sectors of the society. This marks the end of my presentation. Thank you. You are very welcome to ask any questions.
Thanks for the presentation by Sun Yu and CFO Liu. It is the time to answer questions from our analysts. Since most of the analysts in the room are proficient in Mandarin for the sake of efficiency, the Q&A session will be conducted in Mandarin. English-speaking analysts, please feel free to obtain headsets from our colleagues nearby for simultaneous interpretation service. And your question in English will be translated into Mandarin by our colleague. [Foreign Language]
Yes. If you need a headphone, we will be providing you with a headphone. When you raise your questions, please limit it to two at a time. Also, please introduce yourselves.
Well, thank you very much. I am Lin Jiawei, Derek Lam from HSBC. I have two questions. First of all, concerning the loan increase. As the real interest rate is actually rising, a lot of industries want to de-leverage, and they want to cut down on loans. How would this impact you? So compared to today, what do you think about the loan structure and the quantity, please? Secondly, in terms of dividend and also repatriation of capital, even though we have raised it to 54% for dividend payout ratio, in the future, what kind of room do we still have? And in particular, with the stock exchange, is looking into Treasury equities policy.
So, do you think there will be some policies in terms of repurchase on our part?
Well, thank you very much. On my right, Mr. Sun Yu will answer the first question in terms of dividend. Our CFO will answer that question.
Well, thank you very much for the questions. First of all, overall speaking, last year, our loan situation for 2023, the Hong Kong banking sector had been facing challenges. There had been a decrease overall in the market of 3.6%. Overall speaking, as we have said, that there had been a high-interest-rate situation. But we have used the opportunity. We have grew our customers. And also, together with the quality customers in Southeast Asia and locally, we have actually increased 3.3% our loan growth, which is higher than the market. As well, the quality of our loans is also better than the market average.
For the year, there had been opportunities as well as challenges. As the market interest rate was higher, there are certain challenges and risks. Overall speaking, the demand for loans had been relatively weak. Therefore, for loan growth, it had presented some challenges. But at the same time, we see that for the mainland, there are some policies, both in fiscal and also monetary. There are some measures to increase the demand from the market and also the transformation of the industry. We also know that the Hong Kong government is coming up with a number of policies to bring in high talents and also to increase investments. In Southeast Asia, we also see that the economy is returning to much positive levels. We will continue to be stable as well as achieving a progressive increase.
With our strong fundamentals, we will be increasing our loan growth in a number of areas in loan growth. First of all, we will continue to leverage our product and service advantages in Hong Kong. We will fully support the government infrastructure projects and also to cultivate and expand our high-quality customer base and strengthen our cooperation with local blue chips and industry-leading corporates and financial institutions and provide diversified financing solutions such as syndicated loans, RMB loans, green financing. In addition, we will enrich our digital services such as online account opening and online lending and strive to solve customer pain points and serve the financing needs of high-quality SMEs. We will seize opportunities in cross-border markets such as the Three Connections, Three Facilitations to grasp the opportunities for new industries and new business formats from the development of these new productive forces in China.
It will focus on key industries such as AI and advanced manufacturing and fully support our enterprises and optimize the service model to innovative tech firms and provide comprehensive services throughout the entire lifecycle. We will continue to explore Southeast Asian market. Our headquarters will sharpen our leading role and increase our support to our Southeast Asian entities in a number of key industries such as new EVs, electricity, etc., and actively develop customer base with large multinational corporations and Chinese enterprises going global to promote stable growth in Southeast Asian loans. As I've mentioned, we'll focus on the three major markets, cater to customer needs, and select quality deals while balancing between earnings, risk, and volume so as to achieve solid low loan growth and strive to continue to outperform the market for the year.
[Foreign Language]
Next on something that investors are very concerned about. For this year, the board had recommended HKD 1.145. That is for the whole year, just 23% increase for the entire year. The payout ratio is 54%. This is in a steady, progressive manner. The whole year payout was HKD 1.672. We are going to balance, on the one hand, maximize on the shareholders' returns and at the same time the long-term development growth of our company. At the same time, the dividend will be stable to progressive. As we increase ROE and shareholders' return, there are a few things. First of all, we are going to increase our earnings.
As mentioned by the chief executive just now, we are going to capitalize on the high-interest-rate environment to reasonably control our WA scale to increase capital returns and also create favorable conditions while providing reasonable returns to our shareholders. We further optimize the capital structure. At the same time, to provide very good returns to our shareholders. Secondly, as Derek had mentioned just now, we continue to optimize our capital structure. In September of last year, for example, we had redeemed a $3 billion AT1 capital bond. This saves an annual interest expense of about HKD 1.4 billion, which can be returned to attributable profit for our shareholders in the future, increasing the earnings base while paying out ordinary share dividends. Thirdly, we steadily increase our dividend payout ratio. Also, under this basis, we continue to control well our capital.
So overall speaking, in terms of 2024, our dividend payout ratio will be stable between 40%-60%. We strive to steadily increase dividend payout level for the year. In 2023, we have also reviewed our development plan and also our capital targets. As you have mentioned, the stock exchange is looking at certain capital ratios and policies reviews. We are also proactively looking into it. We have an open attitude. But most important is that we have to comply with regulatory requirements. Also, at the same time, we are optimistic and proactive with our future outlook. We will be outperforming the market. Overall, we will be balancing our capital usage and also the effectiveness and efficiency of that usage and to provide long-term, sustainable return to our shareholders.
Thank you, Mr. Liu. Mr. Sun Yu, the second questions. The gentleman, please.
Thank you very much. I'm Sam from Jefferies. I have two questions. The first question is related to NIM. We can see that HIBOR has been moderated and decreased. So my question for the management is that you are delaying the impact of such an issue. So would you please share more and talk about do you have any other useful tools to maintain stable NIM and also to enhance return and credit cost? The second questions. Compared to previous year, it is relatively high. So my question about credit cost, how do you see in the future?
Thank you, Sam. The first questions, I would like to invite Mr. Liu. And about credit cost, I would invite the next speaker.
Thank you very much to your questions. Related to net interest income and NIMs, this is our main revenue source.
In 2023, we have captured the opportunities of interest rate hike for both U.S. dollars and Hong Kong dollars. The interest rates increased. In our presentation, you can see that our net interest rate increased by 29% and NIM increased by 23 BPs. For the future, our net interest income and NIMs could be looked at from several perspectives. First, we need to maintain the stable development of both deposit and loans. Our deposit increased by 5.3% and loans increased by 3%, outpacing the market by 0.2 and 6.9 percentage points, while AIEA increased by 7.4%. Also, we actively optimized our stable growth. We will also optimize asset structure. We will capture the opportunities to underwrite quality loans and dynamically manage our bond investment. We'll also compress low-yield assets and to improve the duration.
Thirdly, we'll control the term structure and pricing of fixed deposit and strive to slow down the decline of CASA. In 2023, our loan-to-deposit ratio spread expanded by 35 basis points. Fourthly, we will push forward our Southeast Asian business, which saw the NIM of our operating entities increase up 84 basis points to 2.96%. This has contributed positively to the group's margin performance. For the year 2023, looking forward, our margins may decrease. It is expected that the Fed will cut interest rates in 2024. It depends on the inflation and the economy of US. For Hong Kong dollars, it will be moderated. However, the interbank level is still relatively low. So HIBOR is maintained at above 4%.
We expect that, including the interest rate for Hong Kong dollar and prime rate for Hong Kong, it will continue to remain high for a period of time because usually, Hong Kong dollar will be passed from US dollars. Usually, Hong Kong dollar's impact will be delayed by about two quarters compared to US dollar exchange. So from the second half of interest rate hike and then passing to HIBOR and also interbank business to Hong Kong, it still takes time. Despite the high interest rate for some time, we believe that the dividend of interest rate increase, especially to NIM, will be moderated for the full year of 2024. We'll face some challenges, especially in loans. We will see increasing competition in the market. And also, for CASA ratio, that will be in a historic low. For the deposit cost, it will be high for a period of time as well.
So all these elements will create pressure for NIM. However, we also see some positive impact for credit interest rate decrease because it lowers the financing cost for the society. It also reduces the cost for our time deposit business. It will also improve CASA ratio and improve the appetite for loans for the society. So we will continue to be forward-looking and dynamic in managing assets and liabilities, maintaining outperforming the market compared to our deposits and loans will also improve capital management and to improve the proportion of high-yielding assets. We believe with all these measures, we'll be able to moderate the impact of decrease of interest rate in the future. In the full year of 2024, we'll be striving to stabilize NIM and to keep a steady increasing trend.
Thank you, Sam, for your questions.
You mentioned in your question that in the second half of 2023, due to some mainland CRE customers and some investors focusing on the investment of Hong Kong property market, indeed, that has resulted in the increase of stressed assets. We expect that the property market will continue to face downward pressure. We will continue to increase stress tests and to mitigate such impact. We have taken up such measures. We expect that in the year of 2024, we believe the credit cost might be able to moderate and decrease because we have made provisions accordingly. We could see that we could expect that in the second half, with the interest rate decrease, the situation will be stabilized. We believe we'll continue to outperform the market.
Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Liu and Mr. Wong, for your answer. Next question, please.
This lady over here.
Thank you very much, Winnie Wu. I just want to follow up with a question. Just now, the NIM, the management had mentioned that this can be further adjusted through the term. Now, I would want to know the duration of that equity investment. And also, for term deposit, what is the average duration or term, please? And another one on asset quality. For mainland CRE, it's about 10% in terms of NPL. And it was 0.14% for classified loans. Do you think that all risks have been revealed? For mainland CRE, if 20% is a POE and POE half of it is already classified, then and also, we see it is the NPL or delinquency rate for high-interest loans is some 70%. So how do you see the next half? For example, will there be high NPL or continued credit rating, lower rating, please?
Because we are all looking at a historic interest rate high level. The cumulative, there had been a 100 basis points increase in terms of Fed interest rates. So we will have a lengthening of the duration so as to lock in higher income. And you would be able to see that we have made such adjustments and arrangements. And such arrangements, I would say, there is a half-year or 6-month increase in the duration. And this has to do with our deposit change. There is a CASA lowering. And there is a process to the loan increase. But for our deposits, it is between 1-3 months or 3-6 months, about this kind of term and duration. And for deposits, for this part, we are also lengthening it. And so for investment duration, we will also be lengthening that in tandem.
This is within our range of risks as reviewed by the board. For our NIM, for this year, it would reflect this kind of adjustment measures of ours. I just want to supplement on CRE from the mainland. Let me go into some details. At the end of the year, for the balance, was HKD 92.9 billion. That is a difference of HKD 7.2 billion. That is not very high. It is 18% for POEs and 82% for SOE customers. In absolute dollars, it is HKD 16.2 billion. The rest of it, about HKD 3 billion, is in LTV. We are rather safe on that. It will not exceed 70%. So that is for and for the others, their repayment capabilities are not in problem. They have no delinquency. In external credit rating, they are still in investment grade. So for mainland CRE, there are some fluctuations.
Their resistance level or capability is relatively good. This is in response to your concern. We have done the investigations and the analysis. Well, internally, from what we see, it is held by the Shenzhen Municipal Government. Therefore, it is an SOE.
Next question, please.
Thank you for your sharing. I'm from CICC. I'm Hada. Two questions. The first question, because see, in the balance sheet, we have added a lot of debt security allocations, I'm not sure what is the purpose? What are the considerations? Do you want to earn the fluctuations and the yield? Do you consider extending the duration for the debt security investment? This is the first question. Second question is more general and macro because we have the strategy of regional development. We have always been mentioning that this is a priority strategy. In this context, the world is facing the de-risking of global supply chains and Chinese companies going overseas. So my question for you is that compared to overseas brands, what are your advantage? And what roles, what differentiations that you can play?
In terms of financial perspectives, deposit and loans in Southeast Asian countries increase very fast. But how about others? Does it help with our business?
To the questions about debt securities, Mr. Liu again about Southeast Asian business, we'll ask Mr. Sun Yu to answer your question.
Thank you for your question. Last year, our debt security investment has reached HKD 1.3 trillion. This is a significant increase. It's HKD 280 billion more compared to last year in terms of classifications. The majority still is FVOCI. This takes up 69%, up by 1.6%. Amortized cost takes up 18.8%. And we also have others for 12.9%. So it depends on the targets and the nature of our debt security investment. And we would also like to reflect the market value and to also balance its implication for our capital.
We also mentioned in the presentation that this is the context of high-interest rate. So we have extended the duration and increased our allocation to bonds. But we still focus on high liquidity and high-quality government bonds. And if we continue to see some interest rate reductions in the future, we will also think about its impact on valuation as we expect that the future cycles will be a decrease of interest rate. The purpose of such investment is for acquiring high-liquidity assets and also improving valuation. This adjustment will be reflected by our considerations on the impact on capital and also the valuation. But the purpose is to get stable, high-quality interest income. Thank you.
Thank you for your question. Regional development, digital development is a priority. You mentioned regional development, indeed. As you correctly mentioned, Southeast Asian business is very important to the business.
Our loan development in Southeast Asian regions has grown very fast. First, I would like to talk about the macros in Southeast Asian market. In 2023, Southeast Asian economies continue to recover steadily with GDP growth reaching 4%, of which you can see Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Cambodia all exceeded 5%. And also, in the second year of RCEP into effect, China and Asia remain the largest trading partner of each other. And in this period, we have enjoyed good development opportunities. During the year of 2023, we adhere to regional and integrated operations as differentiated management model. We also improved and optimized our regional product and management capabilities. In 2023, the customer deposit and loans of Southeast Asian entities increased by 9.5% and 4.6% respectively, both above the group's average. NIM's expansion drove operating income increase. It was up by 39.1%. So their contribution to the group's further increase.
We also continuously enhance risk management and control. The NPL ratio of this region is 2.86%. Its NPL provision coverage ratio was 133.38%. So the provision is sufficient. In our strategy, we will stick to our regional advantage. First, in these regions, we focus on synergies. We also worked with our parent companies and also the regional branches to serve our customers going overseas to Southeast Asian countries. We focus on Belt and Road regions and also key projects in this region. We have seen significant results. We provide professional financing solutions to customers. We also provide green financing products. Second, we've been improving our RMB clearing capabilities and promote RMB business growth. As you see, as mentioned, our Phnom Penh branch was appointed as an RMB clearing bank in Cambodia.
Also, in Malaysia and Manila, our branches of business increased by 39% and 61% respectively in terms of RMB clearing volumes. RMB treasury business grew rapidly by 66%. So it is not just the improvement of net interest income and NIM. The fee income in this region also increased. Thirdly, we have been doing digitalization. We also promote IGTB platform and enhanced our mobile banking functions in the region. We also optimized the online payment experience of local customers, continually promoted convenient services. In 2024, we will further deepen the differentiated development strategy of one branch, one policy, and strengthen the guidance of headquarters. We will also focus on the major Belt and Road project and the key growing global customers. We'll strengthen the regional business coordination mechanism and provide comprehensive financial support. We'll also prudently develop RMB internationalization and promote green economy in the regions.
In the premise of sticking to the risk bottom line, we'll accelerate the growth of our Southeast Asian businesses and increase their contribution. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Liu and Mr. Sun Yu We have the opportunities of up to two questions, please.
This is Gurpreet. I work with Goldman Sachs. I have two very short questions. Number one is on the cost. So the cost was relatively flat and very well contained. Cost-to-income ratio is very low. So with all these opportunities and even the technological advancements, so are we looking at investing more into cost? And then what can be the cost guidance in terms of growth for this year? Second is regards to the growth target. Follow up with respect to the other question because it was not clear to me. If the interest rates remain at this level, are we confident of any loan growth or fee income growth? Thank you.
[Foreign Language]
[Foreign Language]
The first question about cost goes to CFO again. Regarding the growth, I think you are talking about loan growth, right? So loan and fee. Next question, please, Mr. Sun Yu. Next question goes to
Mr. Chenggang. Okay. Thank you.
[Foreign Language]
In 2023, our expenses had been HKD 16.1 billion. We can see that for BOC Hong Kong, compared to our industry, we are better. We are at the highest level in the industry. But at the same time, we have a concept. That is, for example, for IT investment and facilities, it is 9.5% of our total investment. Staff costs have also been increasing. For this year, looking forward, we will continue with our strategic development to sustainably high-level develop and at the same time, preserve our assets and also dynamically allocate our resources and also to safeguard our major projects and also to develop the major areas such as green financing, IT, and also technology. We'll increase our investments in these areas.
At the same time, we will be managing well our costs, and in particular, for low-carbon work and also conservation of energies and also to reach our carbon neutrality. Now, for external, we will continue to raise our online and also paperless transactions and operation. So overall, for 2024, with business growth and also better economic outlook, we believe that compared to 2023, the cost-to-income ratio could see moderate increase. But we should still stay at a better level compared with our peers. Long-term practice of not exceeding 35% remains unchanged concerning our loan side and also how it increases our revenue. Now, high interest rate will continue for a period of time. It will create pressure to loan demand. But overall speaking, BOC Hong Kong will be leveraging on our own strengths. On the one hand, we have strength in the Hong Kong local market.
We have the major blue-chip companies and leaders of the industry as our clients. And also the cross-border, especially in Southeast Asia and Greater Bay Area, we have our strengths as well. So overall speaking, our comprehensive income, including fees, we will be competitive. And basically, we'll be customer-centered. And at the same time, we will be balancing between returns and risks as we grow steadily and exceed the industry average. But at the same time, in high-interest rate levels, we will continue with our high growth and high returns. And for fees side, with 2024 as macroeconomics return to healthy status in terms of trade and also trust and also custodian business and other fee income, it will be steadily increasing.
For investment side, for example, in wealth management and also brokerage income, with the economy coming back up, we will grasp opportunities, in particular, using insurance as a major lever. We will be raising our capability in the market and also optimizing our products to bring in more customers so that in our fees, there will be steady increase in terms of income.
Thank you very much for the replies. This is the last question now.
Hi. Thank you for taking my questions. I'm Michael from Citi. I have two questions. The first question, in Hong Kong real estate market for the year of 2024, what is the outlook for the risk profile? And also, we could see some decrease. How about the collateral values? Do you have any concerns? And also for Hong Kong and mainland China or market outside of Hong Kong and China, do you have any NPL formations or exposures? Second question, I would like to follow up in terms of capital. In recent two years, the interest rate might persist for some time. The loan growth will not be as fast as before. So the ROE is relatively high. Do you have any satisfactory CET1 ? It is very high for the moment. So without any loan growth, do you expect any satisfactory capital planning management? Thank you.
For the first question, we would like to invite the speakers to answer your questions. CEO, please. CEO.
Thank you, Michael, for your questions. Actually, we have talked about mainland CRE. The property market balance has reached HKD 274.5 billion. In terms of percentage, it takes up 21.6%. It is 1% down year-on-year. This decrease is not significant. But in terms of loans by geography, we lend to Hong Kong by 77%, 16% to mainland China. And you asked about exposure to other regions as well. But first, we would like to clarify. We don't have any lending to the US. For other regions, we mainly lend to Europe. And in terms of category of loans, the HKD 270 billion that I mentioned, we are talking about building loans taking up about 15%. 34% has collaterals. The LTV is below 42% that we talked about.
For the rest of 50%, it was lent to major blue chips in Hong Kong with good asset quality. So we don't have significant concerns. In terms of NPL, that is in line with the group's average without any specific points to notice. Thank you.
I would like to get to the questions about capital. I understand your considerations of increasing shareholder returns and reducing CET1 level. We also have several rounds of communication with investors. We have also been working hard here, striving to research and understand more. In Hong Kong banking industry, our capital requirement is relatively high because Hong Kong has a mature and stable banking industry. This is the core of our advantage in Hong Kong. In the retail banking, the CET1 average is 17.2%. So 19% of the group is relatively high. We are a G-SIB.
So in Hong Kong, we maintain a relatively high capital ratio. It's prudent. It helps us to stand against shocks and external elements. And second, if you look at our operations in the last several years, we continue to outperform the market and peers. So here, I believe that to maintain the stable and good operations, we also require capitals to support our business development. And more importantly, we need to convert this capital into the return to shareholders. You also mentioned in your questions that the stock exchange also has several tools to adjust or to improve the capital profile of banks. We also study them follow closely of regulatory requirements. We have maintained close communications with different parts of regulatory entities. We also think about how to improve our return to shareholders. In recent years, we have been steadily improving dividend payout ratio as well as shareholder return.
We maintain the sentiment of cautious optimism. That said, we'll continue to practice prudent development and to provide good returns in the long term. Thank you very much for your questions and the answers.
If you have any further questions, please feel free to contact our IR team. It is our honor and pleasure to exchange with you today. Thank you for your long-term support. See you next time.