China's PE scale exceeds 10 trillion yuan as a first

The Assets Under Management (AUM) of Private Equity (PE) firms and privately offered funds exceeded 10 trillion yuan for the first time. [Photo/VCG]

The Assets Under Management (AUM) of Private Equity (PE) firms and privately offered funds exceeded 10 trillion yuan for the first time, China Fund News reported on Wednesday.

The real payment of AUM of PE firms and privately offered funds rose to 10.21 trillion yuan ($1.56 trillion) by the end of August, the Asset Management Association of China (AMAC) revealed.

The number of private equity firms has risen to 20,652 by the end of August, an increase of 542, compared with one month earlier. In addition, the number of privately offered funds has increased to 60,688, 1,954 more than that in July, the AMAC data showed.

The total number of employees in these private equity firms currently stands at 228,900 and 164,900 people have registered in a professional system, accounting for 72.04 percent of the total, the report said.

Private equity firms are mainly based in Shanghai, Shenzhen and Beijing, with 4,324 firms in Shanghai, 4,092 in Shenzhen and 3,922 in Beijing, AMAC data revealed.

In terms of scale, China's private equity firms and privately offered funds match publicly offered funds, which was 10.68 trillion yuan by the end of July, the report said.

Typically, investors of private equity firms include insurers, government-backed funds, corporates and wealthy individuals.

According to a report of China-Venture Group, there were 589 private equity deals in the first half of this year and their investments totaled $28.3 billion, up 4.5 percent year-on-year.

China's mass innovation and entrepreneurship programs are the major forces for the robust development of China's private equity funds, contributing to nearly 62 percent of the total PE scale, China Fund News reported.

China's innovation and entrepreneurship initiative began in 2014 and in July, the State Council, China's Cabinet, released a guideline that the government will encourage State-led investments as well as private investments in startups, especially those in the high-tech sector,to help finance innovation.