Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), the country's biggest bank by assets, will offer domestic investors a second overseas investment product later this month following strong demand for its first offering.

ICBC's first product, which went on sale last Monday, invests mainly in money-market notes with a six-month maturity promising investors returns of 3 percent to 7 percent. The bank said Friday it sold 200 million yuan (US$25 million) of the product in its first four days. The subscriptions for the initial product will close Wednesday.

The bank didn't provide details on the second overseas investment product, but said it would be open to both individual and institutional investors.

The new product launches follow the government issuing rules in April allowing banks to take institutional and individual funds in yuan and invest them in fixed-income products offshore, which typically generate less volatile returns than equities.

Analysts said they expect the new program, often referred to as the Qualified Domestic Institutional Investor (QDII) program, to release pent-up demand from domestic investors to diversify their asset holdings by moving some funds abroad.

The program also marks a major step toward China opening its capital account. The country has approved six banks to offer overseas investment products and granted US$8.3 billion in quotas to five of them.

Editor: Donald