Bank of Communications and China Everbright announce "basic errors" in succession; listed companies' disclosure quality issues awaiting correction

Securities Times reporter Huang Yulin

Recently, two listed banks’ announcements have repeatedly shown data “blunders.” After Bank of Communications disclosed an incorrect dividend amount due to insufficient rigor in its information disclosure review, China Everbright Bank also showed an obvious issue of misaligned data formatting in its annual performance report released simultaneously on the A-share and H-share markets.

On March 27, Bank of Communications issued an announcement on its 2025 profit distribution plan. In the announcement, “cash dividend of 3.247 yuan per 10 shares for the full year of 2025 (tax included)” was mistakenly written as “cash dividend of 3.247 yuan per share for the full year of 2025 (tax included),” meaning “per 10 shares” was mistakenly changed to “per share.” Bank of Communications issued a corrigendum on March 30.

Immediately afterward, on the evening of March 30, China Everbright Bank released its 2025 annual performance report on both the SSE and the HKEX. However, in the initially published annual reports on both exchanges, the “asset size” data of multiple branches showed misalignment in formatting and were mixed up. For example, China Everbright Bank’s Shenzhen branch had total assets of 2933.82 billion yuan at the end of 2024. With the number of branches remaining unchanged, in its 2025 annual report, the asset size it labeled was 518.78 billion yuan—equivalent to a shrinkage of more than 80% over one year—which differs greatly from the actual situation.

After that, China Everbright Bank has corrected the version of the annual report published on the SSE. But when comparing it with the data in the annual report version published on the HKEX, there are still significant errors, causing the same bank’s branch asset size disclosed on the two exchanges to be very different, drawing market attention.

On the evening of April 1, China Everbright Bank’s H shares published on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange an announcement requiring revisions to the previously published preliminary performance information (i.e., the annual performance announcement). The corrected figures show that, as of the end of 2025, the asset sizes of China Everbright Bank’s Shanghai branch, Shijiazhuang branch, Tianjin branch, Qingdao branch, Yantai branch, Ningbo branch, Shenzhen branch, and Chengdu branch were 4431.88 billion yuan, 1202.69 billion yuan, 1013.25 billion yuan, 980.1 billion yuan, 726 billion yuan, 818.94 billion yuan, 2866.99 billion yuan, and 961.35 billion yuan, respectively.

Before the correction, China Everbright Bank’s H-share annual report mistakenly wrote the asset sizes of the above branches as 395.4 billion yuan, 2866.99 billion yuan, 598.36 billion yuan, 4431.88 billion yuan, 274.74 billion yuan, 3384.88 billion yuan, 518.78 billion yuan, and 1458.84 billion yuan.

Currently, including the branches mentioned above, data for dozens of branches under China Everbright Bank have all been corrected. China Everbright Bank said that the corrected content did not affect any other materials included in the annual performance announcement.

“Annual reports and announcements of listed companies are an important reference for investors’ decisions. Although the problems of these two banks this time are ‘elementary mistakes’ rather than intentional falsification, consecutive blunders will erode the market’s trust in the authenticity and seriousness of information disclosure,” said Dong Ximiao, Chief Economist of CMB, and deputy director of the Shanghai Finance and Development Laboratory, to Securities Times reporter.

Dong Ximiao said that banks are financial institutions that operate on credit. The authenticity and effectiveness of data not only affect their own information disclosure, but also affect the public’s and the market’s confidence and trust in banks. In the next step, the banking industry, especially listed banks, should take measures from multiple aspects, strengthen internal management, eliminate elementary errors, and accelerate the improvement of the quality of information disclosure.

First, optimize the information disclosure process and establish a multi-tier review mechanism, clarifying the responsible person and the time limits for every step of information disclosure—from drafting, to review, to publication; strengthen the “multi-person recheck” system, requiring that major announcements may be released only after at least two people independently review them. At the same time, introduce intelligent proofreading tools to automatically detect and verify key information in announcements, such as the currency units of amounts, data definitions/interpretation, and time checkpoints.

Second, strengthen internal controls and accountability for responsibility. Establish a clear mechanism to identify and pursue responsibility for information disclosure errors, so that every conduct that appears to be an “elementary mistake” has a corresponding responsible person who accepts accountability; incorporate information disclosure quality into performance evaluation indicators for relevant positions to form rigid constraints.

Third, strengthen cross-market and cross-border information disclosure coordination mechanisms. Dong Ximiao emphasized that the incident at China Everbright Bank exposed a coordination gap when A+H shares disclose simultaneously. When banks are listed in multiple places, they should establish a unified annual report preparation and review platform to ensure that the data sources for both places are consistent; formulate contingency plans for information disclosure across markets—once a problem is identified, publish corrigendum announcements in both places simultaneously at the earliest opportunity.

(Editor: Qian Xiaorui)

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