And the bank has made sure to be among the first to put in place new offerings suited to most of the measures that eased capital flow across borders in the Shanghai free trade zone over the past few years.

It also sees China as an important source of new clients for its wealth management and private banking businesses as the number of China's high net worth individuals is on the rise.

Another area Winters is keen to put more focus into is China's Belt and Road Initiative, which seeks to strengthen ties with countries in central and south Asia, the Middle East and east Europe through infrastructure and communication links.

"We operate in over half the countries where the initiatives is being rolled out," Winters said, "the bank has been and always will be a financier of underline infrastructure so that sort of initiative coming out of China is very suited to our business strategy."

He is also prioritizing enhancing digital capabilities in retail and corporate banking business, especially in emerging markets that have demonstrated more willingness to adapt to new financial technology to meet demand otherwise not satisfied by under-developed traditional financial infrastructure.

"We can be the one that does the leapfrogging or the one to be jumped over," Winters said.

Standard Chartered will spend $1.4 billion this year on technology, both in its own shop and on outside companies that it seeks to work with and "share intellectual content."

The bank's private equity arm has been backing financial technology startups across emerging markets. It invested $25 million in Vietnamese mobile wallet service MoMo, the startup announced earlier this week.

In August, Standard Chartered's PE arm also led a $207 million C series financing for Chinese peer-to-peer online lender Dianrong.com. That funding was said to be the largest amount ever raised by a Chinese online lender for a single round at the time.