Remarkable achievements from Chinese banking reform

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2006-11-27 09:30

The capital adequacy ratios of 10 listed commercial banks now exceed 8 percent, according to Tang, who also mentioned progress in reforming credit cooperatives in both urban and rural areas.

China is well on the way to fully opening its banking sector, he said. By the end of September 2006, over 70 foreign banks from 22 countries had set up 252 subsidiary banks and sub-branches as well as 242 operational organizations and representative offices in China, and their assets accounted for 2 percent of the total assets of the Chinese banking industry.

A total of 18 overseas strategic investors have bought in to twenty-five Chinese commercial banks, providing equity worth 18.1 billion U.S. dollars, according to Tang.

The government will lift restrictions on Renminbi and foreign-currency transactions by solely foreign-funded banks and Sino-overseas joint venture banks when the new regulations on foreign-funded banks come into effect on December 11.

The situation is different for Chinese branches of foreign banks. Apart from exceptional cases where an individual, having obtained the approval of the banking regulatory body, makes a fixed deposit of no less than one million yuan (127,000 U.S. dollars), Chinese branches of foreign banks are banned from offering Renminbi services to Chinese citizens.

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