Chinese SOEs maintain rapid profit growth

BEIJING - Chinese State-owned enterprises (SOEs) continued to see rapid profit growth in the first 10 months of the year as the economy held steady, official data showed Tuesday.

Combined SOE profits rose 24.6 percent year-on-year to 2.39 trillion yuan ($360 billion) for the January-October period, the Ministry of Finance said on its website.

The growth slowed slightly from the 24.9-percent increase in the first three quarters but was still markedly higher than the 21.7-percent expansion seen in the first eight months.

Business revenue of SOEs totaled nearly 42 trillion yuan during the period, up 15.4 percent from a year ago. Their operating costs went up 14.6 percent to 40.61 trillion yuan.

By the end of October, the total assets of SOEs stood at 150.63 trillion yuan, while their liabilities surpassed 99 trillion yuan, both up more than 10 percent compared with one year earlier.

SOEs in the non-ferrous metal, steel, coal, oil and petrochemical industries enjoyed relatively large profit increases, but power generation firms suffered significant declines, the data showed.

China has thousands of SOEs, but many have stagnated due to a lack of competition. The government is trying to improve their performance through reform, moving toward mixed ownership and market-oriented management to improve efficiency.

According to a State Council action plan released in July, China's major SOEs will complete corporate governance reform by the end of 2017. The reform targets SOEs supervised by the central government, excluding financial and cultural firms.