China’s response to the global financial crisis and its post-2008 stimulus package and credit surge marked a critical juncture for its state-directed banking system. One result was the subsequent growth of the shadow banking sector marked by incremental ‘informal institutional adaptation’ and a greater role for markets. We employ historical institutionalist (HI) theory to help explain these developments but critique its current approach to critical junctures which has a limited, temporarily specific and overly static account of institutional change; one which overlooks the importance of changes on either side of the critical junctures and which is unable to integrate its emphasis on critical junctures with alternative theories, such as incremental accounts of institutional change. Using the empirical case of the evolution in China’s post-GFC banking and finance, a revised institutional approach is developed which is able to bridge these theoretical divides.