Center

Establishment of foreign exchange company discussed

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2007-03-17 13:37

Current issues would be the orientation and character of the company, sources were quoted by the newspaper as saying.

"Investment channels of the planned company will include financial securities invested by the Central Huijin Investment," Wu Xiaoling, vice governor of the central bank, was quoted as saying, "and we are talking about some strategic investments."

The planned company would be launched within the year while details such as the capital scale has not been discussed yet, Hu Xiaolian, head of the State Administration of Foreign Exchange, was quoted as saying.

The investment company will issue 200 billion to 250 billion U.S. dollars ofRMB-denominated bonds. Money to be raised will be firstly used as strategic investment for energy enterprises like CNOOC, earlier reports said.

Founded in 2003 as an investment arm of the central bank, the Central Huijin Investment holds shares in China's four leading commercial banks.

In 2005, Central Huijin injected 60 billion U.S. dollars into three of the "big four". The money came from the nation's huge forex reserves.

It is reported that Central Huijin will pump another 25 billion to 30 billion U.S. dollars into theAgricultural Bank of Chinato help improve its balance sheet before the bank is ready to go public.