In March, the asset management trust market rebounded significantly month-on-month, with infrastructure sector trusts driving the recovery in non-standard assets.

China Network Finance April 8 News: In March, after the holiday, demand for on-balance-sheet entity financing was released, and combined with quarter-end efforts to hit targets, reserve projects were concentrated and rolled out, resulting in a significant rebound in the issuance and establishment markets for asset management trusts. Specifically, both the issuance and the establishment of standardized (on-balance-sheet) trusts rose significantly month over month, and the non-standard trust market also strengthened. In terms of product yields, the non-standard trusts’ overall average yield rate edged back up.

Overall market recovery

Data released by Yiyou Trust shows that in March, the asset management trust issuance market saw a notable rebound. During the period, a total of 2,907 asset management trust products were issued, up 1.17 times month over month; the disclosed issuance scale was 140.54 billion yuan, up 94.68% month over month. Specifically, the number of non-standard products issued increased 95.58% month over month, and the disclosed issuance scale increased 82.31% month over month. The number of standardized products issued increased 1.37 times month over month, and the disclosed issuance scale increased 1.11 times month over month.

In the same period, the asset management trust establishment market also rebounded, with both the number and scale increasing. In March, a total of 2,217 asset management trust products were established, up 42.94% month over month; the disclosed establishment scale was 78.7B yuan, up 60.28% month over month. Year over year, the number of established products decreased 10.02%, and the disclosed establishment scale decreased 6.45% year over year.

Liu Xinyi, a researcher at Yiyou Trust, said that in March, China’s asset management trust issuance and establishment markets entered a significantly improving trend, effectively getting rid of the business gap caused by the Spring Festival holiday in February and the subsequent period of relative sluggishness, with overall market activity rising sharply. On the one hand, as the post-holiday pace of enterprises resuming work and production accelerated, financing demand in areas such as infrastructure and industrial & commercial enterprises was released in a concentrated manner; combined with the quarter-end assessment and target-achievement factors, trust companies sped up product rollout, and previously reserved projects were established in a concentrated way. On the other hand, standardized trusts also made efforts simultaneously. Bond-investment-type products benefited from the demand for capital risk hedging, and the number of established products rebounded significantly.

Standardized trusts: growth is significant

Specifically, in March, the number of standardized trust products issued was 1,667, up 963 month over month, a 1.37-times increase. Specifically, the issuance number of fixed-income products increased 1.26 times month over month; the issuance number of hybrid products increased 73.20% month over month; and the issuance number of equity products increased 5.64 times month over month.

At the same time, the number of standardized trust products established grew significantly. The number of standardized trust products established increased by 442 month over month, a 53.45% increase?; specifically, the number of bond strategy trust products established increased 49.75% month over month, the number of combination fund strategy trust products established increased 0.64% month over month, the number of multi-asset strategy trust products established increased 3.54 times month over month, and the number of stock strategy trust products established increased 1.11 times month over month.

In response, Liu Xinyi analyzed that in March, bond-investment-type standardized trusts, as the main force in the standardized trust market, saw the number of established products rebound significantly. In March, China’s A-share market continued to fluctuate and diverge. Investors’ risk appetite declined temporarily, which once again highlighted the risk-hedging attributes of the bond market, driving the bond market to stabilize and recover, providing some support for the fundraising of bond-investment-type trusts. Investors’ willingness to allocate to more stable products increased.

Meanwhile, the number of TOF products established grew noticeably?; in March, the number of TOF products with disclosed establishment was 386? , up 91 month over month, a 30.85% increase?; the disclosed establishment scale was 6.87B yuan? , up 51.44%? month over month. The number of established fixed-income trusts was 1,049, up 394 month over month, a 60.15% increase.

More specifically, regarding performance of various types of standardized products, as of March 2026, among the 11,375 outstanding products included in the statistics, the overall average yield rate of net-value products was -1.78%, down 2.12 percentage points month over month; the median yield rate was 0.10%, down 0.12 percentage points month over month. Among them, the average yield rate of bond strategy trust products was -0.07%, and the median yield rate was 0.19%. During the same period, the CSM All Bond Index’s March yield rate was 0.30%, and the Wind Pure Bond Fund Index’s yield rate was 0.29%.

Liu Xinyi said that the overall returns of bond strategy trust products were slightly lower than those of mainstream bond indices and pure bond fund indices, with average returns under slight pressure; however, the median still remained positive, indicating that most products’ performance was relatively steady, and only a subset of products performed weakly, dragging down the overall average level. Overall, they still showed relatively good anti-volatility characteristics.

For equity strategy trust products, the average yield rate was -6.06%, and the median yield rate was -7.39%. During the same period, the Shanghai Composite Index, CSI 300 Index, and CSI 500 Index fell by 6.51%, 5.53%, and 12.02%, respectively.

In response, Liu Xinyi analyzed that equity strategy trust products’ average returns slightly outperformed the Shanghai Composite Index but were a bit worse than the CSI 300 Index; the median performance was relatively weak as well, reflecting that under the backdrop of the overall market adjustment, performance dispersion among equity strategy trust products was fairly pronounced. Overall returns were under pressure in tandem with the equity market, and the effects of active management differed to some extent across different products.

Non-standard trusts: average yield edges back up

On the other other side, in March, non-standard products performed similarly to standardized ones, with both the number and scale of established products increasing significantly. During the period, the disclosed number established was 748, up 30.94% month over month; the disclosed establishment scale was 54.97B yuan, up 49.28% month over month. Among them, for non-standard financial products, the disclosed establishment scale increased 226M yuan month over month, a 3.03% increase; for infrastructure-related products, the disclosed establishment scale increased 16.84B yuan month over month, a 66.57% increase; and for industrial and commercial enterprise products, the disclosed establishment scale increased 379M yuan month over month, a 9.66% increase.

Liu Xinyi said that driven by quarter-end timing, trust institutions accelerated the rollout pace of compliant projects, and the previously reserved and raised products were concentratedly completed for establishment registration. At the same time, enterprises’ quarter-end liquidity allocation, optimization of existing debts, and concentrated release of infrastructure financing demand all supported the rebound in market size.

In terms of yield, in March, the average expected yield of non-standard trust products was 4.79%, up 0.03 percentage points month over month. From the perspective of invested areas, infrastructure-related products’ average expected yield was 4.79%, unchanged from the previous month; non-standard financial products’ average expected yield was 3.83%, down 0.30 percentage points month over month; industrial and commercial enterprise products’ average expected yield was 4.94%, up 0.11 percentage points month over month; and real estate-related products’ average expected yield was 5.06%, up 0.03 percentage points month over month.

In March, the average term of non-standard trust products was 1.72 years, and the term shortened by 0.16 years? month over month. Among them, the average term of infrastructure-related products increased from 1.54 years to 1.55 years; the average term of non-standard financial products decreased from 4.30 years to 3.58 years; and the average term of industrial and commercial enterprise products decreased from 2.07 years to 1.62 years.

For the performance of non-standard trusts, Liu Xinyi analyzed that from the overall market view, the average yield of non-standard trusts edged up, mainly benefiting from the quarter-end effect and marginal changes in the funding environment. On the one hand, current monetary policy is moderately accommodative and the benchmark interest rate remains stable; on the other hand, in March, enterprises’ liquidity arrangements at quarter-end and the demand for optimization of existing debts were released in a concentrated way, pushing up pricing for non-standard financing. Combined with the equity market’s turbulence and low yields in the bond market, under an environment of asset scarcity, non-standard trusts’ attractiveness improved, and increased funding supply provided support for the rebound in yields.

From the perspective of regional allocations, high-quality provinces in the Yangtze River Delta remain firmly among the industry leaders. Jiangsu and Zhejiang-related businesses continue to run ahead, and some core provinces in the central and western regions also achieved substantial growth. In March, the disclosed establishment scale for Jiangsu was 6.05B yuan? , up 39.22% month over month; for Zhejiang it was 5.3B yuan? , up 1.04 times month over month. In addition, Shaanxi Province’s growth performance was also particularly impressive: the monthly disclosed establishment scale was 1.57B yuan? , up 1.13 times month over month.

(Editor: Zhang Xiaobo ）

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