Asia-Business

News from China

Huge Internet finance firms to be assessed

7th August 2017

CHINA will explore methods to include large Internet financial businesses of systemic importance in its macro prudential assessment, said a central bank report issued late Friday.

The People’s Bank of China, the central bank, will improve its supervisory system and strengthen regulation of Internet businesses, let industry and local associations play a bigger role in supervision, and promote new technology, said the report on regional financial development.

Development of Internet finance has helped broaden the financial reach, improved efficiency of financial services, given Chinese more investment options, and helped some small businesses get badly needed loans.

The first peer-to-peer lending platform opened in 2007, and exploded in popularity, with the number of such platforms increasing 18-fold between 2012 and 2015 and the combined transaction volume jumping about 40 times over the period, said the State Information Center.

On top of P2P lending, Internet finance also covers third-party online payments, crowd funding and other financial services. As a result, risk in the Internet finance industry has wide repercussions.

Authorities have strengthened supervision on businesses such as P2P lending, Internet-based asset management and businesses spanning boundaries, third-party online payment, and advertisements of Internet financial services, the report said.

Since the start of this year, the PBOC has placed financial market practices under MPA for strict control of liquidity risks and maturity mismatch risks.

Source: Shanghai Daily, August 7, 2017

China’s SUV market set to expand slowly in 2017

4th August 2017

CHINA’S sport-utility vehicle market is expected to post slower growth this year, according to estimates from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers.

China’s sales of SUVs are set to hit 11 million this year, up 20 percent annually, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers. This growth is a sharp slowdown from the 44 percent growth of the SUV sector last year.

“2017 will become a starting point for the slowing growth of sport-utility vehicles,” said Xu Changming, director of the Information Resource Department at the State Information Center. “Only companies with competitive SUV models can win market share.”

Sales of SUVs surged 16.8 percent to 4.53 million units in the first half of this year, data from CAAM showed. The growth rate is below the association’s prediction of 20 percent expansion this year.

While the growth of SUVs is slowing, domestic makers’ market share rose.

“Domestic manufacturers have contributed a lot to the growth of the SUV sector in the first half of this year,” said Shi Jianhua, deputy secretary-general of CAAM.

The market share of domestic vehicle makers took up 59.6 percent of the total SUV sector in the first six months, 3.6 percentage points higher compared with the same period last year, data from CAAM showed.

This development in the domestic vehicle sector is down to cost control measures and the introduction of new models into the market, Shi said.

“Domestic brands are still leading in market share and have the potential for further growth,” said Zhang Zhiyong, an independent auto analyst.

While the growth rate has slowed down, the market share of SUVs is climbing, which means more and more people are choosing these vehicles.

The market share of SUVs rose to 40.2 percent in the first half year, up from 16.7 percent in 2013, data from CAAM showed.

The rise is driven by rising demand from young and middle age buyers in third and fourth-tier cities in China, according to Shi.

Source: Shanghai Daily, August 4, 2017

BRICS trade ministers see fruitful results of meet

2nd August 2017

BRICS countries have signed deals spanning trade, investment, intellectual property rights protection, and technical exchange to promote multilateral cooperation, China’s minister of commerce said yesterday on conclusion of the 7th Meeting of BRICS Trade Ministers in Shanghai.

Agreements were reached in facilitating trade, boosting investment, enhancing trade of services, e-commerce, and intellectual property rights protection, building a multilateral trading system, and strengthening economic and technical cooperation, said Zhong Shan, minister of commerce and chairman of the meeting.

“The meeting fully demonstrated the BRICS spirit of openness, inclusiveness, and win-win cooperation,” Zhong said. “It came up with remarkably fruitful results and laid a solid foundation on the trade and economic front for a successful BRICS Summit in Xiamen in September.”

Ministers have approved the establishment of the BRICS Model E-Port Network to improve trade efficiency among BRICS countries.

Under the initiative, members are encouraged to share information and experiences in building E-Ports and host dialogs and workshops to improve connectivity.

To expand trade of services, ministers approved a road map that will start from enhancing cooperation in tourism, education, and medical service sectors.

Zhong said BRICS countries have huge potential to expand the trade market as Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa accounted for a fourth of the global economy, although they only generated 11 percent of the world’s total trade of services.

E-commerce will also be boosted to bring more foreign products from BRICS countries to people’s tables.

Ministers approved the BRICS E-commerce cooperation initiative to help upgrade the e-commerce industry, create jobs, and lift small businesses into the global value chain.

Source: Shanghai Daily, August 3, 2017

CBRC to take tough stance on risk control

31st July 2017

CHINA’S top banking regulator will increase efforts to prevent and control risks in the banking sector.

The country’s banking sector’s risks are generally manageable but more measures should be taken to deal with risks brought by cross-market and cross-sector products and other emerging businesses, said a statement released after a work meeting of the China Banking Regulatory Commission.

The CBRC will promote inclusive finance to play a bigger role in backing economic growth and guide banks to trim unnecessary charges worth over 44 billion yuan (US$6.5 billion) for their customers.

New moves will be taken to guard against risks such as supervising closely highly risky institutions and strengthening internal management and risk control.

The CBRC will also introduce private investment in the banking sector and keep opening up the industry.

A total of 18 new or amended regulation frameworks are set to be rolled out this year, the statement said.

Source: Shanghai Daily, July 31, 2017

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