Recently, FTSE Russell announced a significant revision to the inclusion criteria for its flagship index, the FTSE China RMB Onshore Bond Index, starting from November: the minimum issuance balance has been reduced from 3 billion yuan to 1.5 billion yuan, the maximum 30-year maturity limit for corporate bonds has been lifted, and redeemable/sellable bonds and zero coupon bonds are allowed to be included. After the revision, it is estimated that 3482 securities with a total market value of 11.21 trillion yuan will be included, accounting for 12.5% of the index weight, significantly improving the representativeness of Chinese bonds in the global index. FTSE Russell strengthened the global representation of Chinese bonds by revising the index rules, reflecting the growing attraction of the Chinese bond market. And this trend is also more intuitively reflected in the domestic market - since 2025, the "new issuance" of bond indices has significantly accelerated, with the number of issuances doubling year-on-year. It not only covers equity linked bond indices such as the Shanghai and Shenzhen 300 and Shanghai 180, but also extends to sub sectors such as target maturity bonds and local government special bonds, forming a multi-level bond index system. Experts interviewed by reporters stated that the acceleration of the bond index's launch this year is not only a direct reflection of market expansion, but also plays a key role in activating market vitality, serving the real economy, and facilitating investor allocation in three dimensions. From the market perspective, the coverage of the index extends to areas such as equity linked and target maturing bonds, which can effectively attract incremental funds and improve the liquidity of the bond market; From a physical perspective, thematic indices such as green and science and technology innovation are precisely aligned with national strategies, which can guide social capital to tilt towards key areas such as green development and high-end manufacturing; From the perspective of investors, sub indices such as high-grade credit bonds and short-term pure bonds provide risk return matching tools for banks, wealth management, insurance institutions, and individual investors, further improving the wealth management ecosystem. The dual development context has become clearer. Since this year, China's bond index market has made two-way efforts in the "internationalization" and "localization" dimensions, which not only deepened the internationalization process, but also promoted the domestic market to accelerate the shift from scale expansion to quality improvement. The dual development context has become clearer. From an international perspective, on the one hand, domestic index compilation institutions actively deepen technical cooperation with international index providers such as S&P Dow Jones, Bloomberg, and JPMorgan Chase, accelerating benchmarking against international common rules in key aspects such as compilation logic design, data source screening criteria, and index update frequency, and continuously improving the recognition and adaptability of domestic bonds in the global market; On the other hand, by dynamically optimizing the existing index compilation rules, further eliminating the regulatory barriers for international investors to participate in the domestic bond market, and making the index more in line with the global capital allocation habits and risk preferences. For example, the relevant revisions to the "FTSE China RMB Onshore Bond Index" will also be reflected in other indices, including the FTSE China RMB Onshore Bond 0+Year Index, as well as related products derived from these indices. From the domestic perspective, the number of bond indexes in China has continued to expand. According to Wind Information data, as of now this year, the total number of newly issued bond indices in China has reached 987, an increase of 100.6% compared to 492 in the same period of 2024. The index structure is continuously optimized: focusing on the national strategic direction, thematic indices such as the Green Bond Index and the Science and Technology Innovation Bond Index are accelerating their emergence, accurately matching financing needs in areas such as green development and high-end manufacturing, and guiding funds to flow into key areas of the real economy; Improve the risk stratification system, gradually refine sub category indices such as high-grade credit bond index and short-term pure bond index, meet the allocation needs of investors with different risk preferences, and promote the market's transformation from "broad-spectrum coverage" to "precise adaptation". For example, on August 15th, Shenzhen Securities Information Co., Ltd. officially released the Shenzhen AAA State owned Enterprise Credit Bond Index and the Shenzhen AAA Private Enterprise Credit Bond Index. The two indices focus on two types of issuers, state-owned enterprises and private enterprises, reflecting the overall performance of the market's high-grade credit bonds from multiple dimensions, fully meeting the market's investment demand for high-grade credit bonds. Zhang Yue, Chairman of Aoyou International, told reporters that the acceleration of the bond index's launch has effectively enhanced the functionality and overall efficiency of the bond market. Specifically, one is to use popular targets such as the central enterprise credit bond index as a guide to concentrate capital allocation and significantly improve market liquidity; Secondly, relying on segmented products such as the Yangtze River Delta Local Government Bond Index, by dismantling different sources of debt repayment, we can help investors accurately identify regional credit differences and promote a more perfect pricing mechanism; The third is to leverage the dynamic reflection of credit spread changes in high-yield bond indices, making them a key indicator of market sentiment and further strengthening risk monitoring capabilities. The active performance of the bond index market during the year, driven by multiple factors, is not accidental. Through in-depth analysis, it can be seen that this trend is the result of the combined effect of policy guidance and sustained release of market demand. At the policy level, the bond index has always been regarded as an important tool to guide the flow of funds and improve the market system, providing targeted support and system optimization to safeguard market development. For example, at the beginning of this year, the China Securities Regulatory Commission issued the "Action Plan for Promoting the High Quality Development of Index based Investment in the Capital Market", which clearly stated that "we will continue to strengthen the supply of high-quality indexes, continuously enrich the index product system, and accelerate the optimization of the index based investment ecology", creating a favorable policy environment for the "new launch" of bond indexes. In May, the People's Bank of China and the China Securities Regulatory Commission jointly issued a notice on supporting the issuance of science and technology innovation bonds, proposing multiple important measures to support the issuance of science and technology innovation bonds from the aspects of enriching the product system of science and technology innovation bonds and improving the supporting mechanism of science and technology innovation bonds, injecting new momentum into the bond market and providing a bottom tier asset pool with both scale and quality efficiency for bond indices. Data shows that among the 987 newly released bond indices this year, 271 directly focused on the field of technology innovation bonds, accounting for 27.46%. This data not only confirms the expansion achievements of the sci-tech bond market, but also indicates that it has become the core "material library" for bond index product innovation, further promoting the tilt of the bond index system towards serving the field of technological innovation. Market demand is the core driving force behind the launch of bond indices. From the perspective of investors, allocation oriented institutions such as banks, wealth management companies, and insurance companies have been leveraging bond ETFs (exchange traded open-end index funds) to proactively invest in high-quality assets. Data shows that as of now, the asset size of bond ETFs has reached 684.289 billion yuan, an increase of 293.32% compared to the beginning of the year. At the same time, in the second half of 2025, the bond market will experience increased volatility due to factors such as the seesaw effect of stocks and bonds. The high liquidity advantage of bond ETFs will be highlighted, such as the benchmark market making credit bond ETF turnover rate ranging from 36% to 56%, which can meet the rapid entry and exit needs of trading and become a flexible tool for capturing short-term market trends. The dual role of policy guidance and market demand has laid a solid foundation for the development of the industry, and based on this situation, looking to the future, the direction of bond index release needs to further align with the deep market demand and policy guidance. In Zhang Yue's view, a "index registration system" can be implemented in the future, with a hard constraint of automatic delisting of products without tracking within 6 months. At the same time, encourage the compilation of "series", unify the theme index standards, and prioritize the Smart Beta optimization of mature parent indexes to reduce fragmentation. In addition, a "liquidity monitoring pool" will be established to ensure the tradability of the index by setting thresholds for sample bond transaction volume and the number of market makers. (New Society)