On an afternoon in early summer a prospective customer walked into the gleaming new branch established in Shanghai's free-trade zone by dbs, a Singaporean bank that, like many of its international rivals, has long touted China's great promise for its business. The lobby was empty, save for a guard playing a video game. A log showed that the branch was attracting just two or three visitors a day. dbs remains optimistic about China and says that most of its free-trade-zone transactions are routed through other locations. But the torpid atmosphere at the branch points to foreign banks' struggle to crack open the Chinese market.
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