Investors less than impressed by CDs

Large-denomination certificates of deposit made their market debut on Monday, but they got an unenthusiastic reception from many individual and corporate bank customers, who were less than impressed by the combination of low returns and high minimum investments.

Nine major banks, including five large State-owned lenders, started issuing CDs with a minimum denomination of 300,000 yuan ($48,330) for individuals and 10 million yuan for companies.

The rates, however, are just slightly higher than those for similar-maturity deposits - and far below the annualized returns on wealth management products and high profits from the yuan-denominated A-share market.