Jiefang Road Financial Street

　　The Jiefang North Road Financial Street is situated near the Haihe River, stretching from Jiefang Bridge in the northwest to Xuzhou Road in the southeast where it connects with Jiefang South Road. In modern Chinese history, this area was once a hub for foreign banks and was known as the "Wall Street of the East." Today, it remains one of Tianjin’s key financial districts. The street is home to a rich collection of historic buildings, with dozens of well-preserved structures, most of which are over a century old. Visitors here can experience the development of Tianjin’s—and even China’s—financial industry throughout the modern era.

　　The Tianjin Financial City project, centered around Jiefang North Road, has officially been launched. It aims to create an open, intelligent, comprehensive financial service district. The planned financial city will cover a construction area of 2.1 million square meters and include seven major sectors such as finance, insurance, and securities. It will be divided into areas such as the Financial Trading Service District, Financial Plaza, Business Apartment Zone, and Hotel Zone.

　　This is a street that records a century of Tianjin’s transformation.

　　Its name itself is a piece of history. The French called it Rue de France, the British called it Victoria Road, and because it runs through the British and French concessions and lies at their center, it was also known as "Middle Street." Today, it is called Jiefang North Road. But for over a hundred years, people have preferred to identify it by its functional characteristic—as the “Financial Street.” Some even call it the “Wall Street of Northern China.”

　　Having withstood a century of change, most of the financial buildings along this 2,300-meter street and its surrounding areas have retained their original appearance. They record the glorious history of the financial street over the past hundred years and bear witness to its evolution. Today, there are still 26 permanent financial institutions here, including branches of the People's Bank of China and seven Chinese banks such as Bank of China, making it a concentrated hub of financial institutions in Tianjin and a nationally renowned financial street.

　　As a financial hub not only for Tianjin but also for Northern China, the history of this street dates back to the mid-19th century.

　　In 1860, Britain and France successively built roads and constructed buildings within their respective concessions in Tianjin. Starting from the Pont de l'Universel (also known as the French Bridge, now Jiefang Bridge) in the French Concession, they extended a main traffic artery southward, traversing both concessions. This area became the political and economic center of the British and French concessions.

　　Subsequently, various banks, insurance companies, trading firms, and shipping companies established offices in Tianjin to engage in commerce and trade. In 1880 (the 6th year of the Guangxu reign in the Qing Dynasty), the British Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC) was the first foreign bank to set up operations in Tianjin, becoming the city’s first foreign bank, and it officially opened in 1882 (the 8th year of Guangxu).

　　From the late 19th century to the early 20th century, more than ten foreign-funded banks were established along Middle Street in the British and French concessions.

　　Due to the concentration of foreign banks, some larger trading firms and insurance companies also rushed to set up operations here.

　　In the late Qing Dynasty and early Republican period, China’s modern banks began to emerge and gradually gathered in this area. Before 1937, this street had already become a renowned financial center in Northern China.

　　After the liberation of Tianjin in January 1949, foreign banks gradually withdrew from the city, and the Tianjin branch of the People's Bank of China was established on Jiefang North Road. After the reform and opening-up in 1978, Bank of China, Agricultural Bank of China, China Construction Bank, and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China successively set up their Tianjin branches here.

　　The architecture of the Financial Street is distinctive. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, most bank buildings here were constructed with reinforced concrete and materials such as marble, granite, and red bricks. They adopted classical revival architectural styles, featuring grand colonnades at the entrance, exuding luxury, elegance, dignity, stability, and solemnity. After the 1930s, buildings increasingly used concrete and showcased a sleek, modern functionality. Since the 1980s, newly built high-rise bank buildings reflect urban sophistication and the style of the times, equipped with modern multifunctional facilities that mark the new development of contemporary finance.

　　In 2006, the Tianjin municipal government formulated a plan to invest 14.5 billion RMB in the construction of Tianjin Financial City, centered on Jiefang North Road. The financial city covers an area of 113 hectares, with plans to build 1.3 million square meters of new floor space, renovate and preserve 800,000 square meters of historic buildings, and improve supporting infrastructure such as roads and utility networks. The historic financial street is being reborn.