Economy/Resources - 201. page
BBC: China’s Economy Affects the Hurun Rich List
The Hurun Research Institute published China’s 1,000 Rich List for 2012. The shift in China’s economy has affected the list in that the super rich candidates from China showed a net decrease in assets.
In 2012, although 43 out of the top 100 candidates were from the real estate business, for the first time, the number of those who came from the manufacturing sector surpassed those in the real estate sector. Meanwhile, the threshold that delineated the top 1,000 was 1.8 billion yuan, down from 2 billion yuan the previous year. Of these, the number of candidates who held over 10 billion in asset totaled 120, down by seven from the prior year. Of the 1,000 candidates, the net assets of 469 of them decreased, with 37 of them showing a rate of decrease that was 50 percent or more. The professions that were most affected were in the solar energy, clothing, and retail sectors.
The list also showed that 157 or 15.3 percent of the candidates held political titles, including members of the National People’s Congress or the National Committee. Beijing is the city that had the most rich people, with Shanghai in second place and Shen Zheng in third place.
Source: BBC Chinese, September 25, 2012
http://www.bbc.co.uk/zhongwen/simp/chinese_news/2012/09/120925_china_richlist.shtml
Xinhua: HSBC Released China’s Manufacturing PMI for September
CRN: China May Suffer Low Quality Growth
China’s Huge Highway Liabilities Relate to Years of ‘Great Leap Forward’ Development
On September 25, 2012, People’s Daily published an article related to the nation’s highways asking, “How can highways survive with over one hundred billion yuan in highway liabilities?” The liabilities of the 19 listed highway companies amounted to 124.79 billion yuan (US$19.8 billion) for the first half-year of 2012, compared to 105.33 billion yuan (US$16.72 billion) for the same period last year.
On August 2, 2012, China’s State Council announced a plan to lift road tolls for passenger cars taking the highways during major Chinese holidays in order to promote tourism and related industries. At present, the listed highway companies are affected because they have little other income except toll revenue. They have entered into a cycle of “over charge tolls, build more highways, borrow more money, and build more highways.”
Source: People’s Daily, September 25, 2012
http://politics.people.com.cn/n/2012/0925/c70731-19097317.html
Ministry of Commerce: China May Miss This Year’s Target for an Increase in Exports
Housing Ministry: Housing Not Ready for a Resurgence in Price
The Role of the State-Owned Enterprises in China’s Economy
Of the top 500 companies in China, 316 are State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs). They account for 82.82 percent of the total revenue, 90.40% of the total assets, and 81.88% of the total profit of these 500 companies. The top 10 most profitable companies are all SOEs, including three oil companies and five banks.
As of 2007, there were 112,000 SOEs in China, of which 118 were central government owned while the rest were local governments owned.
Until 1994, SOEs had to turn over all their profits to the state’s coffers. From 1994 to 2007, SOEs kept their profits and instead, were required to pay taxes. In 2007, SOEs resumed turning over part of their profits. Depending on different industries, the rates varied from 0 percent, 3 year deferral, to 5 percent and 10 percent. Beginning in 2010, the rates changed to 0 percent, 5 percent, 10 percent, and 15 percent.
The 2011 statistics show that the central government owned SOEs turned over 82.3 billion yuan to the state, accounting for 7.4 percent of their total profits. In 2011 the net profits of these central government owned SOEs went up by 9.7 percent, while the profits they turned over to the State’s coffers increased by 8.7 percent. No explanation was given for the difference in the published official statistics.
(Editor’s note: Although the above information was released at cnpolitics.org back in April, we believe our readers may find these statistics thought-provoking.)
Source: cnpolitics.org, April 12, 2012
http://cnpolitics.org/2012/04/state-owned-enterprise/