News

Yuan Climbs Most in a Week on U.S. Rating Downgrade, PBOC’s Record Fixing (8.8.2011)

China’s yuan strengthened the most in a week, touching a 17-year high, as a Standard & Poor’s downgrade of the U.S. debt rating fueled speculation China will rein in dollar purchases used to limit appreciation.

The People’s Bank of China raised its reference rate for the currency by the most since November after S&P cut America’s top credit rating by one level to AA+ on Aug. 5. The U.S. should avoid letting its currency weaken or taking fresh monetary steps that may worsen the dollar’s depreciation, Xinhua News Agency said yesterday in a commentary. China is the biggest foreign owner of Treasuries, holding $1.16 trillion of the securities as of May, U.S. Treasury Department data show.

The yuan rose 0.07 percent to close at 6.4360 per dollar as of 4:30 p.m. in Shanghai, paring earlier gain of as much as 0.24 percent, according to the China Foreign Exchange Trade System. The currency touched 6.4250, the strongest level since the country unified official and market exchange rates at the end of 1993.

China’s inflation held at a three-year high of 6.4 percent in July, according to the median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg before government data is released tomorrow. Premier Wen Jiabao said at the end of June that there would be “difficulties” keeping the rate within the government’s 4 percent ceiling this year after it exceeded that level every month in the first half.

Shanghai's OTC equity exchange to start in September (5.8.2010)

The municipality's Over-The-Counter (OTC) equity bourse, launched in July 2010 in the city's Zhangjiang Innovation Park (ZIP), is expected to begin operations by September, according to a senior local official.

"We expect that the bourse will not only serve enterprises within Zhangjiang, but also thousands of small and medium-sized enterprises in the Yangtze River Delta region," said Ding Lei, executive vice-director of the administrative committee of ZIP, at a recent rebranding ceremony for the park, a State-level high-tech industrial zone in Shanghai.

The equity exchange, which will mainly serve non-listed companies in the Yangtze River Delta region, has a total registered capital of 80 million yuan ($12.4 million), with Shanghai Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park Development Co taking a stake of 20 percent.

Analysts said the OTC will offer a financing channel for small and medium-sized high-tech start-ups, and further standardize their business operations for the future.

MOITAL's new Investment Program in China and India announced (1.8.2011)

New investment fund of the Ministry of Industry Trade and Labour in support ofIsraeli companies' relocation expenses to China and India is now open for applicants.

For details and submitting click here or visit the following link:

http://www.moital.gov.il/CmsTamat/Rsrc/Maarach/Maarach.html

China soon to issue full plan to reduce carbon intensity (29.7.2011)

China will soon release detailed plans on ensuring that its goal for reducing carbonintensity from 2011 to 2015 is attainable, and it has started looking at technical options forcutting carbon dioxide emissions after 2020.

Xie Zhenhua, vice-minister of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), saidon Wednesday at a conference that a comprehensive plan to allow China to meet its objective -laid out in the 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015) - of reducing carbon intensity by 17 percentreduction will be released soon.

$8b Enter China's VC Market in H1 (8.7.2011)

China's Zero2IPO Group, a leading research institution for the country's venturecapital and private equity industry, said on Thursday that a record $ 8.1 billion entered China'sventure capital market during the first half of this year. In a report released by the group, 605 projects in 29provinces and cities have raised funds from the venturecapital market during the first half, up 56.3 percent year-on-year. Beijing and Shenzhen were ranked one and two in termsof the venture capital investment attraction, the report said. A growing number of venture capitalists have shifted their focus to the country's resource-abundant western regions such as Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region and Inner Mongoliaautonomous region amid intensified investment competition in developed cities, according tothe report.