Strong retail franchise among domestic peers. Above-average level of loan-loss provision. Moderate systemic importance to China's banking sector. Asset quality affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Large exposure to non-Net Asset Value (non-NAV) off-balance sheet wealth management products (WMPs). The stable outlook on China Merchants Bank Co. Ltd. (CMB) reflects our expectation that the bank can maintain its strong retail franchise, above-average asset quality, and resilient capitalization and earnings over the next 24 months. We may downgrade CMB if we lower the sovereign rating on China. We may also downgrade CMB if we lower our assessment of the bank's stand-alone credit profile (SACP) to 'bbb-' from 'bbb'. We may lower the SACP if: (1) CMB's credit growth significantly exceeds our forecasts,
