China Construction Bank Corp. aims to expand overseas but isn't attracted to acquisitions in the U.S. or Europe because those mature markets lack growth potential, Chairman Guo Shuqing said Thursday.

Construction Bank, the country's second-largest lender by assets, after Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd., also remains cautious about buying overseas because "the dust of the global financial crisis hasn't yet settled," Mr. Guo said in an interview with a group of reporters.

In August, Construction Bank bought AIG Finance (Hong Kong) Ltd., the Hong Kong consumer-finance unit of American International Group Inc. for $70 million, Mr. Guo said. But Construction Bank, which also has seven overseas branches and three overseas units, has yet to make any major acquisitions abroad, even as domestic rivals such as ICBC have done overseas deals.

Western markets "carry good opportunities for mergers and acquisitions, but the growth potential is limited," as the financial industry in developed countries is on "a downhill path," Mr. Guo said. Instead, Construction Bank hopes to expand organically to better serve Chinese firms and individuals abroad. It aims to establish branches in Vietnam and Australia by year's end, after opening a branch in New York and a unit in London earlier this year, Mr. Guo said.

The 53-year-old former central banker praised Construction Bank's five-year-old partnership with Bank of America Corp., which owns nearly 11% of the Chinese lender and works with it in areas from electronic banking to risk management. But he indicated that the partnership's development has been slowed by Bank of America's need to deal with the fallout from the financial crisis and recent acquisitions.

The two companies signed an agreement in 2007 to build a credit-card joint venture, but it has yet to be initiated, Mr. Guo said. When it will launch depends on "the interest and wishes of Bank of America," he said. Mr. Guo said the U.S. bank's board has said it is committed to maintaining its strategic partnership with Construction Bank and keeping its current stake.

Mr. Guo, who headed China's foreign-exchange regulator before joining Construction Bank in 2005, sounded a bullish note on the value of the dollar, which has fallen sharply against most major currencies recently. He said the U.S. currency's position won't be replaced by any other currencies -- including China's yuan -- in the foreseeable future as the U.S. economy remains the most competitive around the world.

Chinese banks recorded explosive growth in lending earlier this year, which has spawned concern about the possibility of rising bad loans. New loans soared by 7.4 trillion yuan ($1.08 trillion) in the first half, equivalent to half of China's gross domestic product for the period.

Mr. Guo said the quality of Construction Bank's loan book remains "very good," and that the issue isn't likely to affect the bank's financial performance. Its nonperforming loan ratio eased to 1.71% at the end of June from 2.21% at the end of last year because total loans grew faster.

Construction Bank is China's top lender for infrastructure, which has been booming in the past year because of to government-backed stimulus measures. But Mr. Guo said the bank "can't just live on infrastructure lending as infrastructure building has its cycle." So it is also boosting lending to smaller companies, a trend he called a "revolutionary transformation" requiring it to develop new management models and risk-control measures.