The Commercial Bank of China was founded on May 27th, 1897 (April 26th, Guangxu 23rd) by Sheng Xuanhuai, the right-hand man of Li Hongzhang's Westernization Movement, with its head office in Shanghai. In 198, it was renamed "Daqing Bank". The capital is 5 million taels, and the shareholders are feudal bureaucrats, comprador and capitalists of banks. It is allowed to issue two kinds of banknotes, namely silver dollar and silver, with a maximum denomination of 1 yuan (two). This kind of bank note is in Chinese on one side and English on the other. On the Chinese side, there are printed the words "Commercial Bank of China banknotes will always be used" and "No one will be recognized if the ticket is recognized". On the English side, there is the signature of the hired British manager, Mei Lunde.

The first bank opened by a foreigner in China: Liru Bank of Britain first set up a branch in Hong Kong in 1845, and in the same year it set up its institution in Guangzhou; In 1848 (the 28th year of Daoguang), the bank officially opened the "Oriental Bank Branch" (also called Liru Bank or Jinbao Bank) in Shanghai.