The man surnamed Wan, 23, was caught in the district's Zhangdong Road in the early morning, about 13 hours after the robbery, Shanghai police said on its Weibo micro blog.

The suspect held a knife and robbed an Industrial and Commercial Bank of China branch on Zhangjiang Road, according to the police.

He ran away with about 100,000 yuan ($16,144) but threw the money away to try to escape some people who chased him, the Xinmin Evening News reported.

A salesman from Tai'an, Shandong province, Wan graduated from the Shanghai University of Finance and Economics in 2008.

He confessed that he robbed the bank because he ran out of money and split with his girlfriend early this year.

wuni@chinadaily.com.cn