Dear investors, analysts, and media friends, good afternoon. Welcome you to Bank of China's annual results announcement. First of all, I would like to introduce you 2019 annual results of Bank of China in six aspects. First, our business performance grew steadily. In 2019, Bank of China seriously implement the state under the Party's decision. We steadily seek progress. We stick to the new development concept, supported the real economy to develop. We try to mitigate and prevent risk. We are very innovative in reform. We try to get more vitality, be more responsive and agile, try to speed up the establishment of a global first-level bank in the new age. Ou r performance, making progress steadily. The profit after tax for the year was CNY 201.89 billion, year-on-year increase of 4.9%. The profit attributable to shareholders after tax was CNY 187.4 billion, an increase of 4.06%.
Operating revenue, profits before provision maintained a faster growth. The speed was 9.17% and 7.62% respectively. Second, core financial indicators improved steadily. NIM stabilized. In 2019, group NIM was 1.84%, an increase of 1 basis point as compared to the first half of the year. Fee and commission income grew steadily. Fee and commission income grew by 2.76%. Credit card, internet payments, agency insurance businesses also grew rapidly. Operating efficiency improved continuously. Cost-income ratio for the year was 28%, a decrease of 0.09 percentage point. Capital level maintained steady growth. By the end of December, capital adequacy ratio of the bank reached 15.59%, an increase of 0.62 percentage point as compared to the end of 2018. Thirdly, asset structure continuously optimized. By the end of December, asset scale reached CNY 22.8 trillion, an increase of 7.06% as compared to the end of 2018.
We actively support the financing needs of real economy and expand credit issuance, and increase our bond investment. Total loan increased by CNY 1.25 trillion for the year, an increase of 10.57%. Loan amount to total asset increased by 1.82 percentage point. Bond investment increased by CNY 405.6 billion, an increase of 8.22%. Its percentage in the total asset increased by 0.25 percentage point. We focus on supply-side structural reform and focus on investment in key areas. Our credit structure has been continuously optimized. Fourthly, liability businesses improved its quality. We make continuous efforts in salary payment and receipts businesses. These are basic businesses for us to expand the basic customer and government and the PSU customers.
We try to safeguard the basic services, like basic settlement account and cash management account. We try to optimize business process and improve service quality so as to increase the loyalty of customer. By the end of December, our deposit of the group increased by CNY 934.0 billion, an increase of 6.28%. The capital costs have been controlled effectively. For this interest- bearing liability and the average interest rate of the customer deposit decreased quarter-by-quarter. Asset quality improved. By the end of December, NPL ratio was 1.37%, a decrease of 0.05% as compared to the end of 2018. Special mention overdue loan decreased both. Special mention loan rate, 2.2%, a decrease of 0.68 percentage point as compared to 2018. Overdue loan rate, 1.25%, a decrease of 0.62 percentage points as compared to the end of 2018. Our market position continuously improved.
Standard & Poor's and Fitch upgrade our individual credit rating and short-term issuer default rating. Our external credit rating maintained the highest among Chinese banks, while The Banker m agazine rated us as the fourth bank among the top 1,000 banks in the world. We actively honor our social responsibility and work hard on poverty eradication to help the country to fight poverty. T he board [set up ] Corporate Culture and Consumer Rights Protection Committee to enhance the corporate governance and capability building. We provide comprehensive services to the Second China International Import Expo and try to make preparation for the Beijing Winter Olympic Games to be held soon. We are trying to feedback and return to the society by providing financial services. In 2019, Bank of China centered around the strategic goal of turning ourselves into a global first-level bank.
We have made a lot of achievements with good implementation results for the strategy in six aspects. First, we further deepened our reform . First, with the new age, new requirements, and a new trend. In 2019, we are making many reforms and many breakthroughs. We have initiated and promoted 25 major reform projects and 86 minor projects. We're trying to be more vigorous, and we're trying to establish an innovative, agile, service-oriented, open-minded, and learning headquarter. We further deepen human resources management reform and are trying to enable all the employees to be more entrepreneurial. We also carry out organizational reform for personal banking business line. Digitalization was embedded into the full progress, process of personal banking. We established a globalized R&D system, established Bank of China Research Institute.
In cultivating new driving forces, we focus on strategic layouts in key areas to try to improve our market competitiveness. We speed up the establishment of scenario building and promote the upgrading of customer service model. We try to initiate integration with the overseas institutions and try to optimize to enable our risk control to be more effective. We also implemented data governance reform so as to be more solid in digital development. Next, we make continuous improvement in serve the real economy. First, we continuously make more resources input. Domestic RMB loan increased by a faster speed. We also made a lot of investment in local government bond. Our investment mainly goes to infrastructure, advanced manufacturer, modern service, innovative company, green financing, consumer financing, and other areas. Second, we carefully implement regional coordination development strategy, and the loans to key areas increased substantially.
We are the first among Chinese banks to offer Yangtze River Delta comprehensive financial services plan. We provide active services to Jing-Jin-Ji area and Xiong'an New Area, and we promote the establishment of the demo area in Shenzhen. We also promote the One Body, Two Wings development in Macau. Thirdly, we do hard work in inclusive financing. Inclusive financing loan balance increased by 38% as compared to the end of 2018. The total number of customers reached 400,000, and the financing cost reduced gradually. NPL balance and NPL ratio both reduced, and we revert at the Tier 2 standards of PBOC's targeted reserve-reduction classification. We actively promote services to private companies. POE loans reached CNY 1.96 trillion in 2019, taking up 36.8% of our total corporate loans, an increase of 2.2 percentage points. We underwrite POE bonds increased by 72.5% as compared to last year.
We also speed up digitalization. We set up fintech innovation mechanisms. We have set up a Bank of China fintech company to promote 5G, internet of things, blockchain, virtual reality, and other new technologies to be built into our application scenario. We put forward more resources in IT. In 2019, IT investments reached CNY 11.65 billion, accounting to 2.1% of our total operating revenue. Second, we make new progress in infrastructure development. We promote multi-city, multi-center infrastructure layout. We deepen cloud computing, big data, artificial intelligence, these three new tech platform establishments . We launched big data platform and also enterprise AI platform, Bank of China brand. We also make major breakthroughs in key areas of digitalization. We have set up a digital channel operating mechanism with mobile banking, smart counter , and a smart call center as the core. We speed up the digital transformation of personal banking businesses.
Monthly active customers of mobile banking increased by 48.7%. Digital enabling of sales outlets are speeded out. We set up outlets with 5G AI services and branded business services. We also use a smart counter to make transformation of sales outlets. We promote corporate finance to get online. We implement AI-based risk control, AML, and case prevention, and internal control. We promoted cross-border education, sports, and also elderly people. These are our four strategic scenarios, so as to make new breakthroughs in customer expansion and business development. Fourthly, we make steady progress in globalization. We further improve our overseas institutional layout and further improve our global services capability. Now, our overseas institutions cover 61 countries and regions. We support the Belt and Road Initiative. In total, we provide $160 billion of credit to this region. We also improve our global internet-based financial services capability.
In overseas area, corporate online banking and corporate mobile banking cover 46 and 27 countries and regions, respectively. Secondly, we play the leading role in the traditional business. We are ranked number one in terms of the cross-border RMB clearance and the settlement. Also, we also play the leading role in the international settlement, exchange settlement, syndicated loans, as well as offshore bond issuance and dependent bond issuance, and the cross-border custody business. Also, in terms of the number of currencies which can allow the foreign pricing offering, we reached 111. The third one is about the new business. We launched different types of product services. Also, we try to improve our market influence as well as the service capability. Number five is about the integrated operation of our business.
In terms of value contribution, we have faster growth of our integrated operating module. We use less capital occupation for more capital gain, and then we bring revenue and profit to the group. In terms of the function contribution, BOC has our authorization of our integrated operational function. We have more the spectrum of the service provision. We have more competitive products, and then we have a coordinated system for the implementation of the business. In terms of the brand contribution, BOC Aviation is the most leading and number one in Asia aviation leasing company. BOCI is the earliest established Hong Kong-based China investment bank. BOCG Investment is the unique investment banking platform. A month ago, we had the BOCI China listed in Shanghai Stock Exchange and becoming number four listed company for the BOC brand.
We come to talk about the risk management. We tried to enhance the risk management in 2019. We tried to research about the domestic and international situation. We prepared a contingency plan, and we tried to build this risk management system coupled with the strategic plan of the group, and w e tried to improve the smart risk control construction. We also tried to enhance our credit asset quality management, improve the active management and the proactive management for the risk control and management. We also enhance our management framework, try to enhance our integrated management of the securities and asset management business, and we try to control the liquidity risk and build the early warning system. A ll the indicators for liquidity risk control reach our goal. W e have this steady and controllable internal control and operational risk control.
I should say 2020 is the critical year for us to win the strategy for building well-off society. Banking industry is facing more stringent and challenging environment. We have this outbreak of COVID-19, which imposed great pressure for future development, and we also have the bigger pressure for the economic development. We are also facing the restructuring of the international economy. Fed take the emergent plan to cut the interest rate and restart the QE measures. Chinese economy is also in the transformation period. We try to optimize the economic structure, and we understand there is the hit of the COVID-19 for Chinese economy. W e believe Chinese economies, the fundamentals are good, and we have this long-term optimistic development future. W e are now facing new trends and new challenge.
BOC will steadily implement our central government's deployment and the council's deployment, and we will take the steady manner to implement our strategy. We will carefully implement the supply-side structural reform. We will conquer the negative impacts imposed by COVID-19 outbreak, and we will have more concrete measures taken and deepening our reform and try to revitalize our strengths. W e will build our mechanism for the agile response and try to consolidate our strengths and have the breakthrough in the major points. T his year is the year for enhancing implementation, which means in the key area, key business, we will implement our comprehensive operation in four major areas. We will achieve that sustainable development. We will rely on the science and technological development reform. We will focus on the data governance and the smart operation as well as the outlet transformation and the scenario building.
At the same time, we will prevent risk and control risk properly. BOC will improve our profitability as well as the efficiency of operation. We'll enhance the corporate governance. We will bring more value for shareholders, for our customers, staff, and for the society. We are going to forge forward for building this world-class bank of BOC. Lastly, I would like to extend my thanks to the investors, analysts, friends from media. Thank you for your long-lasting support for BOC support and the development. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Wang . Now, I'd like to open the floor for Q&A. I would like to ask the investors and analysts to make sure everybody has the opportunity to ask question. I give each speaker the opportunity to raise one question. Please remind us about your working unit. Also, I would like to ask our assistant to connect the first phone call.
[Non-English content] First speaker, would you go please?
[Non-English Content] In 2019, BOC has good growth and support real economy's development. I'd like to ask the management, what is the major investment area, l oan issuance area for the last year? Also, I also would like to know about your corporate loan disbursement. What about the size of corporate loans, and how do you balance those loans and the infrastructure manufacturing rate in wholesale, as well as the real estate area? What is the focus, and what are the future prospects of such areas?
Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. I think it's related with our corporate operation. Mr. Lin is responsible for the operation of this field, so I'd like to give the floor to Mr. Lin Jingzhen to answer your question.
Thank you, a nalyst from Morgan Stanley, Mr. Xu Ran. Thank you very much for your care about the operation of BOC. You know 2019, for BOC, we tried to meet the demand of the real economy. We increased the loan disbursement. For the whole year, the RMB corporate loan increased by CNY 553.6 billion , 10.55% growth. In the key area, we have witnessed the faster development growth of the loan disbursement, and we try to optimize the credit structure. We also have a large proportion of mid- and long-term loans. We know since 2020, we have some new challenges and new situations. However, the influence is not that big for the first two months.
By the end of February, BOC broad and narrow RMB corporate loans has been increased by CNY 32.3 billion , CNY 91.8 billion, respectively. With the resumption of different provinces, we have higher demand of the loans, and we predicted that there might be limited impacts of the epidemic towards the Q1 credit growth. By 2020, we will maintain steady growth of the RMB corporate loans, which is moderate higher than that of previous year. We will optimize the loan structure. We will support more new and high-quality enterprises. We will increase the proportion of mid- and long-term loans. We also will improve the quality and efficiency of the financial services. In terms of the key area, infrastructure, road, railroad, city rail, all these are infrastructure sector, which are also the key sectors for BOC to support. During the past few years, we maintained high growth rate.
In 2019, the loan disbursed reached CNY 200 billion. 2020 is a very important year for us to build up this well-off society. The last years were achieving 13th Five-Year Plan. We will try to improve the infrastructure power in this year. With the decrease of the influence of COVID-19, we have the huge demands for the resumption of the enterprises. According to the Ministry of Transport's information released, by 2020, we need CNY 2.6 trillion for the loans to support the road and railroad construction. BOC will increase our loan disbursement in these infrastructure areas to support Xiong'an New Area, Jing-Jin-Ji integration, the Greater Bay Area, Yangtze River Delta integration area. All these are the major strategic area for China. Currently, we already follow up the projects such as Beijing to Xiong'an high-speed rail, and Yukun high-speed rail , Beijing Subway, and Chengdu Tianfu Airport.
Totally, there are 165 projects by 2020. For the whole year, we will maintain a steady growth of the loan disbursed . In the field of manufacturing, by the end of 2019, domestic manufacturing loans balance, which is CNY 1.3079 trillion, accounting for 22.47% of the corporate loans, much higher than the peer banks. In 2020, we will continue our strategy to steady the growth of manufacturing to serve the high-quality development of the manufacturing industry. We will focusing on the advanced manufacturing industry as well as the transformation and upgrading of the traditional manufacturing industries. Number one, we will enhance our support for the modern technological development and high-end facility building and manufacturing. On the other hand, we will support the upgrading of the traditional manufacturing industry in the field of technological renovation and upgrading. We will support the optimization and upgrading of the traditional manufacturing industry.
At the same time, we will enhance the loan disbursement for the mid and long-term loans and optimize the credit structure. In the field of wholesale and retail, by the end of 2019, the loan balance for the wholesale and the retail are CNY 208.6 billion and CNY 41.7 billion. We have steady industrial structure. COVID-19 short-term influence may affect the development of retail enterprises and industry. I n the long run, we still have very strong demands of consumption for the Chinese people, s o we predict that we will have a steady growth of the consumption. In 2020, based on the trends of the consumption development, we will combine online and offline retail enterprises development. We will support them in terms of their demands for borrowing.
In terms of the real estate lending business in 2020, we will stick to the house for living rather than for speculation guiding principle. We will have a steady land price, real estate price, and also the steady outlook. Therefore, the loan for real estate will be steadily growth. We will support the common department-based residential building development. We will support Tier 1 cities and provincial capital cities, what we call the city clusters building. Those are the hot demand of the people for real estate. W e also need to optimize the asset quality and credit structure. In terms of the key region development, we will implement our regional coordinated development strategy. We will increase the loans in a steady manner for those key regions. For example, we have, among all the Chinese banks, we first issued the Yangtze River Delta integrated financial service option.
We try to support the Jing-Jin-Ji coordinated development and Xiong'an New Area development. We also try to support Macau's One Body, Two Wings development strategy. In the future, we will play the full role of comprehensive financial service provision, and we will try to research into our softer power and softer strengths to grasp the opportunity for further development. Thank you.
Thank you, Vice President, Mr. Lin. Now, we will like to continue to the next question.
We will have the second question. Please ask the question.
It is a great opportunity. We have seen the annual report. All the asset quality statements have registered large improvement, including the NPL, special mention ratio, as well as the overdue ratios. We know that this year, we have experienced some difficulties because of the influence of the pandemic. Under such a macro environment, the regulators have come out with guidelines asking the banks to moderately raise the tolerance ratios for the NPLs for the banks. Based on this year's basic situation, can you please give us an illustration of the determination standard of NPL? [audio distortion] Loan will it be a continuation of last year's standard? For this new year's policy for raising the tolerance of the NPL, how are you going to push forward the standard with your own plans, e specially you have a lot of overseas assets? Will it impose pressures to the overseas asset quality?
Your question seems to be a pretty big one, but it mainly focuses on the risks. It is truly a focus point, not only the analysts who are paying great attention, I believe the media are also paying great attention. I would like to invite Mr. Liu, the Risk Officer, to give us an answer.
Indeed, as you have mentioned, in 2019, BOC's asset quality is maintained a continuous rise, and the NPL has one increase and one decrease. For the special and the overdue loans, we have achieved the double deduction, and the difference between overdue loan and NPL is CNY 15.6 billion. The ratio between the overdue 90 loan and the NPL is 56%. Based on the influence of the COVID-19, the uncertainty factors are on the rise. For the short-term influences, as you can see, the accommodation, tourism, wholesale, retail, transportation, and such consumption services industries was the most hardly hitting. Also, because of the shrinkage of the demand, because of the transportation lockdown and the delayed resumption of the production, we know that the small and medium enterprises are among the first to be impacted.
Also, we have seen a higher ratio of breach of individual clients, and also because of the continuous reduction of the repayment capabilities of the clients, and also because of the delay of the judicial litigations. We know that such recovery work will be very difficult. From the future prospect, we will see that the overdue amount and its proportions will be on the rise. F acing such a situation, according to the regulators, BOC would like to do a better job to do a r esumption of the production, especially for those clients who are mostly impacted by the pandemic, particularly for the small businesses, individual businesses. We would like to make further arrangements of the repayment, and the renewals, and others, so that we can do a better job in the credit protection as well.
We would also take the measures of reduce the loan rates, as well as extending credit loans and medium- and long-term loans to reduce the impact to the enterprises. Our bank has also made a survey on the negative impact to the asset quality because of the pandemic. We have conducted the scenario analysis and the stress tests so that we can come out with a solution for each and every customer to come out with better solutions. For example, optimize the existing loans. We would also like to utilize all types of technological tools to resolve the NPL, to enhance the write-off, w hile at the same time, we would also like to pay great attention to the technological iteration and the adjustments of the policies, pay great attention to the business opportunities of the new economy, the new infrastructure, and the new consumer areas.
Through all these measures, we hope for this year, we can still maintain the stability of the asset quality as well as the credit cost. As you have mentioned about the overseas branches, indeed, with the spreading of the pandemic overseas, we have seen increasing uncertainty of the overseas business. We have seen a large deal of the volatilities of the financial market. As one of the Chinese banks with internationalization ratio, we believe that we are facing greater challenges. A s you know that most of our clients are basically concentrated on the high-quality, large-scale enterprises and those enterprises that has gone global, so t he impact can be said limited. However, for the mid- and short-term, we are under a great pressure. F or the long term, I guess it is still manageable.
We would ask all the overseas branches to make measures to identify such risk assets so that we can take active measures to mitigate such risks. You have also mentioned about the relaxation of the regulation standard above the NPL. Actually, for the determination of the NPL, it was not adjusted, and our bank will be fully compliant with the regulators so as to have the determination of the NPL.
Now, I would like to continue to the next question.
We would like to move on to the next question. You can ask the question.
[audio distortion] Benchmarks, a lso, what types of measures has BOC taken? [audio distortion] Liability allocation? What is your prospect of the annual NIM for this whole year?
Indeed, I believe China Life is one of our BOC's most important shareholders. First of all, I would like to thank China Life for your continuous investment on the BOC. Actually, the NIM is really what we focus great attention on the capital market, and also, the overseas economy's reduction has a great impact. Mr. Sun, Vice President, has the mandate in this regard, responsible for the supervision of the overseas branches. I would like to ask him to answer this question.
Indeed, actually, in 2019, we have a very stable NIM. NIM is 1.84%, 1 basis point higher than that of the first half of the year. I believe this is truly a remarkable achievement because of the negative external situation. First of all, we can see that currently, according to the LPR Plus spread pricing, and also such conversion work of the benchmark, commercial project has initiated on the 1st of March, with down warding of the LPR and the profit of the loan will be on a decrease. S econdly, the Fed has taken the QE measures. As you know, since March, the Fed has reduced their interest rate by 150 basis points, which has come out to a historical low.
At the same time, the Fed also took the measures of the asset repo and other measures to provide liquidities of the U.S. dollars. It will have a direct influence of our asset profit. Also, f or the conversion, according to the number 30th notice in 2019, on the 1st of March , we have initiated the work. Until the end of February, altogether, we have more than 9 million items of such conversion, accounting for CNY 6.05 trillion. More than 99% involves a personal loan, and we will have such conversions through online. For the corporate loan, we do not have a lot of customers. Basically, it is on a one-off basis. Currently, work is on progress. Looking into the future, we will have a proactive judgment of the market.
By providing the support to the real economy, we would like to increase our efficiencies of the asset liability allocation. First of all, we would like to continuously optimize the asset structure. We need to optimize the existing and to use better of the newly added assets. We would also like to increase the proportions of the loan to the bank's investment. Secondly, we would like to control the liability costs so that we can accelerate the scenario establishment, providing better services to the customers. Also, the financial assets should be our main things that we need to further better use the customers' capital so that we can reduce the impact to the NIM because of the change of the market environment.
Now, we would like to come to the last question. Now, to the next question.
[audio distortion] My question is about the capital [audio distortion]. We think the bank [audio distortion] preferred shares, which have attracted higher attention of the market. For this year, do you have any sense of [replenishment] concerning the peak sectors or some plans, some programs, and what is your target CAR, the [audio distortion] ratio? Thank you for your answer.
Thank you, UBS, for your kind question. Starting from last year, indeed, within the capital replenishment, we have several wonderful and remarkable moves. We would like to give the floor to VP Wang Wei to address this question.
Thank you, the analyst from UBS, for your question on the capital replenishment. Actually, for a very long period of time, our capital plan has been paying great attention of the internal accumulation and the external replenishment. The first aspect is to increase the utilization ratio of the capital so that we can increase the organic usage capabilities of our capital. Secondly, based on the requirement of the regulators and the capital of our bank, we would reasonably push forward the replenishment of external capital. As you know, in 2019, our bank has finished CNY 40 billion perpetual bonds and CNY 100 billion domestic preferred shares, and CNY 70 billion in second-layer capital bonds. F or this whole year, we have a replenishment of the capital amounting to CNY 210 billion, reaching a historical high.
Perpetual bonds, actually, it is the first such issuance of all the domestic commercial banks, and CNY 100 billion preferred issuance has also reached our biggest issuance scale globally. In this March, we also issued altogether $2.82 billion of overseas preferred shares with a rate of 3.6%. We have created several records. That is to say, that is the coupon rate historical low of the G-SIBs in the other first-tier capital. Also, we have a set of other records, including the Chinese capital banks of the other first-tier capital coupon ratio lowest. We will continue the CNY 40 billion of the perpetual bonds. Also, we will initiate the next round of capital replenishment plan and initiate relevant capital replenishment work. As for TLAC implementation requirements, according to FSB, by 2025, G-SIB banks in emerging countries should satisfy these requirements.
We are working together with Chinese regulators on TLAC implementation. We will adopt different measures to satisfy TLAC requirements. In supporting the real economy, we also will promote t he asset to be lighter and stick to high-quality development. Thirdly, increase our capability of internally accumulate capital. On the other hand, based on market situation, shareholders' requirements, and regulators' requirements, in line with the capital status of the bank, we will make a rational arrangement of capital replenishment plan, and make use of different channels, different methods to supplement the capital, and explore TLAC tools issuance. By the end of 2019, our capital adequacy ratio reached to 15.59%, our historical high. Our capital adequacy ratio are always higher than domestic comparable banks.
In the future, we will stick to the concept of value creation and stick to the high-quality development model. While satisfy regulatory requirements, we will steadily increase our capital adequacy ratio. Thank you.
That's all the questions for analysts and investors. If you have further questions, you can approach me or approach investors relationship department of our bank. Now, I want to give the floor to Mr. Zhang Shouchuan. He will host the question-and-answer session for media friends. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Mei. Media friends, analysts, and investors, good afternoon. My name is Zhang Shouchuan. I'm the Director General of the General Office of Bank of China, and also, spokesperson of Bank of China. Welcome you to this press conference. Although I cannot see you, but I can feel that you have a great care, great support, and a great help for Bank of China. I would like to, on behalf of Bank of China, to express my sincere thanks to all the media friends for offering support to Bank of China. I hope that the COVID-19 situation can be over soon, and that we can see you soon. Now, we would like to invite media friends to ask questions. I hope that all the media friends can ask only one question. Please identify yourself before you ask questions. Thank you.
Now, we connect to the next person to ask questions.
Thank you, Mr. Zhang. Thank you for giving me this opportunity. My name is [audio distortion] from Financial Times. My question is that after COVID-19 happened, the country have adopted a series of measures to fight against the virus. This means all the banks will play a key role. Wh at are the measures that has been adopted by Bank of China? Will this COVID-19 situation have a major impact on the performance of Bank of China?
Thank you for your question. At the beginning of this year, faced with this epidemic, Bank of China have made a fast deployment in our actions to support virus fight and to support resumption of work. Now, the floor is given to President Wang Jiang, President of the bank. Thank you.
Thank you for your question. Since COVID-19 happened, Bank of China stick to the oral instruction and written instruction of President Xi Jinping, and we sincerely implement the actions and the instructions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China. Also, we try very hard to prevent the virus and also to provide financial support so as to honor our responsibility as a state-owned bigger bank. I want to introduce you the overall situation of COVID-19 work. Faced with the outbreak of COVID-19, in line with the Party and the State Council's arrangement, we set up an emergency leadership group headed by Mr. Liu Liange, Chairman of the Board. Also, in line with the Party and the regulators' requirements, we try hard to prevent virus spreading and try to maintain business continuity to provide full support to the virus fight.
We have provide payment services and other financial services as well. In China, domestically, we have issued relevant announcement and guiding opinions for COVID-19 prevention to specify the working mechanisms for the virus prevention and control. We have formulated and issued branch prevention emergency plan to guide domestic institutions to follow the requirements of local governments and local regulators to maintain business continuity and customer service quality. In overseas countries, we also issued COVID-19 prevention and business continuity plan for overseas subsidiaries and branches. Because of the spread of this virus in overseas countries, we also issued a notice to further guide our overseas institutions to fight against this virus. Up to now, the disease prevention and control work of the bank is steadily making progress. The overall situation is stable, and the employees have a stable mind, and the work is orderly carried out.
We have provided normal operation of global financial services. While preventing virus to be spread within Bank of China, we also provide services to disease prevention, resumption of work, and the real economy's development. We provide targeted financial services. At the beginning of the year, we have increased our loan expansion. By the end of March 26, domestic RMB lending increased by CNY 518.5 billion as compared to the beginning of this year, or CNY 303.9 billion higher than previous year's increase. We offer our support to companies listed in the National Key Epidemic Prevention Enterprises List so as to help with the fight against the virus. In total, we have extended preferential loans of CNY 16.107 billion to 711 companies on the National Disease Control and Prevention List. We are among the top within peers.
We have extended CNY 7.8 billion preferential loans to 366 companies on local lists for disease prevention. Besides this lending support, we make use of different financial instruments to strengthen our support to disease prevention companies. For example, we underwrite and issued disease prevention-themed bond. In total, the issuance size was CNY 18.15 billion. We also issued CNY 500 million of CD for domestic disease prevention. Also, we issued corporate social responsibility bond, in total CNY 675 million, for overseas disease prevention and small and medium-sized companies' development. Also, we provided investment and personal lending to medical services, and government officials, a nd confirmed patients, and suspected patients, and spouses. If they are suffering in this disease process, we give them grace period for payback of personal loans or credit card default.
Also, if some of the customers lose income because of this COVID-19, we will extend the loan payment period and plan the payment of principals for them. We also organized our employees to procure a lot of PPE materials to support the frontline fighters against the virus. Also, in total, our employees, our Party members, have donated CNY 156 million worth of goods to the frontline fighters. We also provide insurance policy to 922 medical institutions, i n total, 127,000 doctors and nurses or disease prevention staff. Under the prerequisites of disease prevention, we also provided services to resumption of work. We provide resumption-of-work loan to support small and medium-sized company to recover.
For wholesale and retail, as well as recreation, catering, logistics, transportation, culture, and tourism industries, b ecause of the COVID-19, they are in difficulties, and we do not take away the loan or try to call back the loan or have difficulties in loan issuance. We try to provide extension and refinancing to them. We also adopted 13 measures to stabilize the foreign trade to protect the foreign trade industrial chain and supply chain. We give full pledge to the rural bank and promoted disease-fighting lending to help the farmers to engage in spring farming. We also adopted announcement in providing enhanced financial services, supporting resumption of work, and help with the social order and economic order. We also issued measures to support Hubei Province disease fighting and resumption of work.
We have adopted various measures to support resumption of work and to support advanced manufacturing, to support poverty reduction, and to support livelihood and employment. While supporting domestic resumption of work, we saw the spread of the virus in overseas countries. We implemented the concept of shared faith and shared community. We organized domestic branches to buy personal protection equipment and to support overseas fight against the virus. We have provided assistance to 40 countries or regions in the world. In the next step, we will fully play our role as the Chairman of China-Italy Business Committee, China-France Business Committee , China-U.K. Chamber of Commerce . We will try to help Belt and Road Initiative countries, help our major trade partners, and help those hard-hit countries and regions, and provide PPE to them so as to establish shared community for humankind.
Also, the media friend have asked the second question about the impact of COVID-19 on the bank. COVID-19 will inevitably have a big impact on the economy and on the society. About the impact of COVID-19 on our annual result for 2020, we believe that the virus impact is short-term and within control. Now, domestic situation of the disease is improving, and many more companies resume work. By the end of yesterday, about 97% of our sales outlets opened to the public. In Hubei Province, about 70% of our sales outlets in Hubei Province resumed work. Domestic businesses are stabilizing and are coming back. Now, we look at the overall economy of China. COVID-19 will not change the overall trend of good economic performance of China. I think COVID-19 will change people's life and change people's production method, and change people's behavior and business model.
Commercial banks have to achieve digital transformation to be more agile, to establish more scenarios, to be more smart in operation, and to enable our operation with high tech. This will bring new opportunities and challenges. During COVID-19 epidemic process, we began to feel that because of our strategic implementation, active implementation of digitalization, smart operation, we have coped well with this COVID-19. We have many businesses that are not influenced by this pandemic. For example, cross-border payment, credit card cross-border payment, they are not influenced. The growth of this type of business has exceeded the previous years and reaching the historical high. Talking about the pandemic impact, actually, it's a great opportunity for us to transform our business. We will implement new developmental strategy and focusing on the supply-side structural reform. We will try to promote science and technology-based digital transformation.
We will build the scenario effectively to support the real economic development. We will use our high-quality development to support the society's high-quality development. We will reach our goal of building this world-class bank. In terms of overseas market, we know there is the spread of the pandemic in the overseas countries, which impose great pressure and hit the global economic development. Focusing on this challenge, we first pay high attention to this. We also research into the possibilities, and we formulate the contingency plan to prevent different types of risks. We try to reduce the negative impacts of this pandemic towards our business. No matter from the domestic market or the international market or the operation of our business, we believe that the pandemic impacts towards our business is controllable. Thank you. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Wang. Now, I'd like to invite other media friends to raise questions.
Thank you. I'm from Ta Kung Pao . Since the spread of the pandemic is going to cause the [audio distortion] , and Bank of China is [audio distortion], s o what do you do? What is your future global strategy and operational strategy to address these pressures? Thank you.
Thank you very much. In the very long run, Chinese BOC played the leading role for foreign trade-based financing. In particular, after the outbreak of the pandemic, we tried to play a role to ensure the industrial chain smoothly implemented. Now, I'd like to give the floor to EVP, Mr. Lin, to answer your question. Pl ease, Mr. Lin.
Thank you, my friends from Ta Kung Pao. After the outbreak of this COVID-19, BOC actively implement our national strategy for the contain of the pandemic, as Mr. Wang has already give you the introduction. I will focus on the financial support. We have six steady support. In particular, we need to support the foreign trade financing. We need to play the leading role of BOC, and we are a professional and international bank. F ocusing on the foreign trade, we have five areas we consider as the pain point. We are implementing strategies to support in these areas. Totally, there are six measures. The first one is to have this comprehensive financial support to stabilize the development of foreign trade. We have totally 13 measures. We have the special service options.
During the pandemic period, we provide no less than CNY 100 billion to the enterprises focusing on the foreign trade. Also, we have the special financial service plan to be implemented in Shanghai, Zhejiang, Shenzhen, Sichuan, totally more than 10 provinces. We work with the local Ministry of Commerce. W e have, this year, a joint stable foreign trade special service. The second measure is we support the enterprises to finish their existing orders and accept new orders. W e focus on this industrial chain. We work with the SINOSURE as a mechanism for us to interact with each other. Recently, we already start our implementation in 12 key areas. We try to enhance our cooperation for the export credit insurance. The third measure is, in an overall manner, to support the protection goods procurement, people's livelihood, and big commodities import procurement.
During the Spring Festival, we have already finished more than 200 contingents' remittance for the protection gears purchasing. We also try to improve the scenario building to have this online financial service provision. We have the one-window financial service provision function. We use the iGTB platform to provide our customer with more convenient account-opening services, and we try to meet their demands for the cross-border settlement. We also provide the document review online as well as online settlement of the foreign exchange. We also finish the function of the settlement of the documents. Number five is to try to reduce the burden for the small and micro private companies. We try to exempt their financial service fee or commission fees. We try to use other products, for example, supply chain financing and the note document discount, those structural products, to support the SMEs and the micro enterprises.
Number six, we play the full role of professionalism. BOC is the leading bank for foreign exchange and cross-border RMB business. We try to work with other provinces and peer banks to build this green channel for the cross-border financial service provision, focusing on different types of trade-related conflicts and risks. We provide consultation for our enterprises in terms of the relative risks, and we have more than 120 hotlines to answer questions. Recently, we have witnessed the spread of this pandemic. The market is concerned about this, and we may trap into this global recession. All these are a new challenge for BOC's business operation. We will change those crises into opportunities. We have two pillars, pandemic prevention and improve the operation and management.
We try to focus on the existing risk, and we try to have the localized measures to address those challenge , and we will maintain steady development of our globalization strategy. In the long run, we have mitigated the influence of this pandemic. We will promote the integration development strategy within and beyond China. We will try to allocate good resources, and we will do good service provision for this Belt and Road strategy. We will promote international capacity cooperation, and we will improve our support for the enterprises.
At the same time, we will just improve our global service capability, and we will have a more complete global product system to have an optimized business structure, and we will enhance our customer relation. We will try to improve our overseas market as well as our customers, and we will use our financial force to support China's globalization process. Thank you. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Lin. Now, I'd like to invite our media friends to ask question. Next question.
Next media journalist.
[audio distortion] The transformation of the personal business. I realize that you re structured the personal business towards the more digitalization of your strategy. I'd like to ask you a question. How do we understand this transformation, digital transformation? What is the expectation? Now, we are facing downward pressure with the economy, and this pandemic has hit our economic [audio distortion], so I'd like to ask BOC, what is your strategy to address this challenge, in particular in the field of the personal consumption? Thank you.
Thank you for your question. Last year, we have the personal business transformation of digital service provision. I'd like to thank you for your question. Now, I'd like to give the EVP, Mr. Zheng, for him to answer your question.
Thank you. Thank you for your question. Actually, you have a big question, two small questions. I would like to answer your first question first. As for this new personal business lines structure, it includes three Tier 1 department and two Tier 2 department, namely personal digital financial sector, consumption financial department, and bank card center. The two second tier are digital platform center and private service center. We can understand this transformation from four perspective. Logically, our reform is in accordance with our company strategy upgrading, and we need to address the trend and also, we need to change. First one is the digitalization. Digital service provision is going to be the gene of BOC for our personal financial products, process, and business line. The second one is the problem-oriented transform. We will have the agile business lines and strengthened headquarter.
The third one is the customer-oriented. We will have the customer-based sales model. The fourth one is the market-oriented. We will have our uniqueness among the cross-border business, private banking business, consumption financing, and the business cards. In terms of the digital transformation, we have the agile front desk. We have the mobile banking. We make mobile banking more comprehensive and integrated. We will build the scenario. We're deepening the integration of online and offline business operation. The second one is to build an integrated mid-office. We try to promote the Smart Account, smart equity, and s mart investment advice consultation. The fourth one is the high- efficient back office. Meaning, we will promote the digital operation and smart risk control, and precise sales. In terms of the focal area transformation, it's going to be data-driven, and the second one is going to be smart.
We will try to improve the products, make it smarter, and we will also have the smart operation for the fraud prevention. The fourth one is what we call the build the ecosystem, mean, open ecosystem. We have the system for the account and user, as well as the payment. The fourth one is the factor integration. We will provide a whole-life-cycle comprehensive service to our customer. Number five is the mobile-first principle, using mobile banking as the core. We have the online business coverage, and we also have this real-time online business provision. In terms of the transformation efficiency and effects, even though it's not very long, and we have already have the achievements, i n 2019, the RMB deposit has been increased substantially among our peer banks. For personal number, the number of the personal customers has increased substantially.
In terms of the mobile banking, we have more than 300 items optimization. The active monthly customer number has become the number one among the Big 4 commercial banks. We also try to make it more smarter. We have the BOC Smart Invest. The total investment reaches CNY 12.3 billion . For the digital account, we have about 57.04 million clicks monthly. We also have this, the equity management system for our personal customer. We have [700 TB] for the big data management scale. We also have 1,894 the customer labeling for improving of our data box. I encourage you to use more BOC's mobile banking. I believe you will love it. As for the second question, during the pandemic period, we enhanced our online support.
We launched the service of the policy package and toolkit from policy, customer, data, products, channel, and customer managers point to provide a series of online service and online products. For example, we have the resumption loan and extension of the loans products. We also have the comprehensive solution for the Medicare workers. We also have the mobile phone-based pandemic prevention zones. We also have this distance interview for the personal loan applicants. We also have the BOC broadcasting. We try to support the small and micro enterprises resumption. We provide steady support for that. Also, BOC reduce the interest rate for BOC E-Loans, thus, to promote more consumptions among the consumers. We also play our strengths as a globalized bank. We use the global banking app to provide services. By the end of February, we have 55% of the increase of the customers gained.
In the short term, the pandemic will not only have a comparative impact to the economic development and the consumption of the consumers. It will also, on the mid- and long- term, change the behaviors of the individual customers. It will also change the interactions between the bank and customers. Such non-touch contact will become the main trend for us to serve our customers. I believe this pandemic has firmly, d efinitely determined our determinations of our digital transformation. In the future, we'll further enhance our digitalization transformation capability, accelerate our transformation to the online scenario so that we can build up the scenario equal building and continuously come out with the digitalization scenario applications. A s we would be able to come out with differentiated services, push forward the product innovation, diversify our product portfolio so as to build up a very flexible service platform for our customers.
We can also set up a multilayered consumer financial system. We would also accelerate the wealth management digital transformation, come out with open platform, and build up a very strong R&D system, s o as we would be able to satisfy the needs of the steady increase of the consumers' demands.
Now, because of the time limit, we would like to give the floor [audio distortion] to ask the question.
If you hear this, I would like to thank all of you to give me such an opportunity. My name is [Diana Shi] from China Securities Journal. I want to ask under such a very unique external environment, the inclusive businesses operation pressure is on the increase. Will BOC make any adjustments to the inclusive finance credit policy? What is your expansion plan for the whole year? What is the comprehensive financing cost, and what is the asset quality of the existing loan?
Thank you, Madam [Diana Shi] . Indeed, inclusive financing is something that has been paid great attention to by BOC. We would like to give the floor to the EVP, Mr. Wang Wei, to address this question.
I would like to thank the question from this journalist. I believe the question is also near and dear to the heart to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, the State Council, as well as the regulators. In 2019, BOC, when providing the inclusive finance, we have reached all the requirements of CBIRC in its two increases and two controls requests. We have also satisfied the second-tier reserve reduction by the PBOC by the end of 2019, and the loan balance of the small businesses is CNY 412.9 billion, an increase of CNY 114.5 billion, an increase of 38%, higher by 27% of the other loans. We have a loan number of altogether 397,500, an increase of 30,300, and the NPL ratio is 1.77%, a decrease of 1.55%.
In 2019, the average rate of the new loan is 4.3%, a decrease of 111 basis points. While at the same time, the PBOC required a targeted loan balance of CNY 439.1 billion, an increase of CNY 116 billion, and we have also provided services to 2.5 million customers by the end of 2019, a mong which the loan customers reaches 206,000 with a balance of CNY 44.467 billion, NPL 1.268%. After the outbreak of the pandemic, our bank has put forward a series of inclusive finance measures. We have come out with the fight of the disease of the loan, and also easy, quick loan, as well as reaction to the pandemic loan and other special finance product. Until 24th of March , altogether, we have provided over CNY 3 billion to the 394 customers in our list.
We have also provided more than CNY 1 billion to 210 customers in our local important enterprises list. For those small enterprises, we are not going to arbitrarily seize the loan, extract the loan, or delay the extension of the loans. Through the renewal or adjustments of the repayment plans and the loan restructures, the renewal of the loan without paying the principal, we would be able to provide better support. Until the 10th of March , we have already extended the loans for more than 2,786 small businesses, reaching an item of altogether 3,871, and amounting to CNY 10.7 billion, among which extensions reaches CNY 1.7 billion, and the renewal reaches CNY 2.5 billion, other measures CNY 6.4 billion. We have also provided CNY 3 billion of the delayed interest repayment for 1,293. We would also like to make the measure for the first half of the year.
The loan increase rate should be no less than 30%. For the annual rate, it should be reaching around 20%, and our inclusive finance plan increase should be no lower than CNY 90 billion. Also, last year, we are going to reduce the financing cost, reducing our cost on the basis of last year by 50 basis points. For those micro enterprises located in Hubei Province, such a reduction will be reached as 100 basis points. Lastly, we would like to improve the service efficiencies of the innovation project, especially for those online financing products . For example, the BOC enterprise e-loan and credit loan, as well as other types of products like low-cost or no-cost loan renewal products like [inaudible], and et cetera.
Fourthly, we would like to provide some other measures to enhance our mechanisms internally to provide better services to the inclusive businesses. Fourthly, we would like to keep a bottom line of the asset quality. Lastly, we would also like to play a full role of the BOC Fullerton Community Bank, its unique strength, so that we can provide better services to the counties, to the small businesses in the rural areas, as well as the individual businesses, so that we can make our own contributions from the BOC. Thank you very much.
Thank you, EVP, Mr. Wang. Because of the time limit, we would like to conclude this round of the Q&A. I would like to thank the journalists and the media friends under such impact of the pandemic, participated in this online annual results announcements. I would also like to thank all the audience who have participated in this online annual result announcement through online. I would like to declare the conclusion of the 2019 BOC annual results announcement. Once again, my heartfelt thanks to your continuous support and your attention to BOC in this time of spring. Wh ile the flowers are in full blossom, I would like to wish all of you a great health and a wonderful, prosperous year.