MNI China Press Digest April 1: CSRC, PMI, Bank Capital

Highlights from Chinese press reports on Tuesday:

• The China Securities Regulatory Commission will make the regulatory environment for companies going public overseas more transparent, efficient and predictable, Shanghai Securities News reported, citing a CSRC statement. The CSRC will optimise processes and further strengthen coordination and information sharing among departments, while also supporting Hong Kong to consolidate its international financial centre status, the statement said.
• China’s manufacturing PMI reached 50.5 in March, up 0.3 percentage points from the previous month and the highest since April 2024, demonstrating obvious signs of economic recovery, according to Zhang Liqun, a special analyst at the China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing. However, the purchasing volume and price indices both declined indicating oversupply and insufficient demand remained prominent, Zhang added. Looking ahead, officials need to increase the intensity of countercyclical adjustments and significantly strengthen government public investment to expand domestic demand, Zhang said.
• The Ministry of Finance’s planned CNY500 billion special treasury bond issuance to replenish the core tier-one capital of four major state-owned banks will leverage CNY4 trillion of additional credit, Securities Daily reported, citing analysts’ expectations. The move will likely generate an eight-fold multiplier effect and increase banks’ capacity to serve the real economy, said Ming Ming, chief economist at CITIC Securities. The included banks, Bank of China, China Construction Bank, Bank of Communications and Postal Savings Bank of China, had a core tier-one capital adequacy ratio of 12.2%, 14.48%, 10.24% and 9.56% by end-2024.