Jiangsu, a coastal province in east China, is said to establish a province-level asset management firm.
People close to Jiangsu Guolian Development (Group) Co., Ltd., a solely-owned state investment platform of the province, confirmed the report in an interview recently, stating that with a registered capital of CNY 5 billion, the asset management firm would be registered in Wuxi, a fast-growing city there. And by then, it would become the first province-level asset management firm across the country.
He reiterated that documents about this had been sent to both financial institutions and industrial regulators in the province and judging from this, there would be great possibility for the asset management firm to be set up soon. As both the initiator and a major shareholder of it, Guolian Development would send staff to take part in its operation, with other shareholders of it to be solely-owned state firms under the wing of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC) of the province.
He added that instead of the Jiangsu Banking Regulatory Commission, the SASAC and the financial office would jointly manage and supervise it. Based on capital of shareholders, it would run and operate in the initial period of time. And later, it would apply to finance with a low cost through issuing financial bonds.
Sources said previously that a major reason for the asset management firm to be settled down at Wuxi but not Nanjing, capital of the province, or Suzhou, a famed tourism destination in the country, was that Wang Yuan was promoting to acting mayor of Wuxi from the position of vice secretary-general of the provincial government in March this year. Prior to this, Wang served as director of financial office of the province, too. The financial office always participated in preparations made for establishment of the asset management firm, thus Wuxi was selected as its registration site finally.
The Ministry of Finance (MoF) and the China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC), the top Chinese banking regulator, jointly released rules on the management of mass transfer of non-performing assets of financial firms in 2012 and according to the rules, provincial governments in the country are allowed to establish or license only one asset management firm to take part in the mass transfer of non-performing assets of financial firms locally in principle.
Guolian Development was established in Wuxi in May 1999 with a registered capital of CNY 8 billion and has had stretched out reach to the fields of trust, securities, banking, futures, and so on.
