The deal enables BMO to distribute investment products, including mutual funds and exchange traded funds via the ICBC network.

Bank of Montreal has signed a memorandum of understanding with ICBC, China’s largest state-owned bank, in a sign of how the Canada-headquartered institution wants to expand its connections with the Asian country, media reports said. 

The MoU was signed in November but only announced publicly today, according to the Globe and Mail. The pact sets terms co-operate on matters from asset management and trade finance to sharing techniques for curbing fraud, the publication said. 

The deal enables BMO to distribute investment products, including mutual funds and exchange traded funds via the ICBC network.

"What we're doing is just kind of setting things in motion," Gilles Ouellette, group head of BMO Asset Management, who also chairs the board of BMO ChinaCo, was quoted by the report as saying. "We're getting our alliances ready so that when it does open up, we're ready."

The report noted that a central part of the MoU is how it puts BMO Asset Management's proprietary products on ICBC's shelf. BMO owns a 28-per-cent stake in Chinese mutual fund company Fullgoal Fund Management Co, but hasn’t yet distributed BMO asset management products in China. On the other side, ICBC has a growing presence in China, the report said.