China Press Digest: Wednesday, November 15

     BEIJING (MNI) - The following are highlights from the China press for

Wednesday, November 15:

     China's gross domestic production growth could reach 6.4% or even higher in

the next several years, with increasing domestic demand important for both

domestic and world growth, the Economic Information Daily, a newspaper under the

official Xinhua News Agency, said in a commentary Wednesday. An important

development that is underappreciated is that the Chinese import growth rate has

been higher than the export growth rate for 15 months, meaning China has

replaced developed economies as the main pillar for global trade, the newspaper

said. China has also become the main force for global economic growth - China's

annualized average contribution rate to world growth from 2012-2016 was 30.2%,

compared with 17.8% for the U.S., 5.3% for Europe, and 3.8% for Japan. (Economic

Information Daily)

     China's announcement that it will lift restrictions on foreign investors'

shares in Chinese banks may not have a dramatic effect in the short term but its

long-term influence will be positive, the Financial News, a newspaper managed by

the People's Bank of China, reported Wednesday, citing analysts. The new policy

means foreign investors could enhance their ownership shares in Chinese banks

and even control a Chinese bank with a majority of share, the newspaper said.

While there's a chance foreign investors will become the biggest shareholders in

some small- to medium-sized Chinese banks, it will be hard for them to control

large banks, analysts said. Dong Ximiao, a researcher at the Chongyang Institute

for Financial Studies at Renming University, said the next steps in China's

opening up will be furthering yuan internationalization, improving the

development of the offshore renminbi market, allowing more qualified foreign

investors to get financing in the domestic market, as well as improving China's

foreign exchange management system. (Financial News)

     Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said Tuesday that in the next five years China's

outbound direct investment would reached $750 billion while foreign direct

investment in China would rise to $600 billion, the Xinhua News Agency reported

Tuesday. Li said in a speech to the 20th meeting of the Association of Southeast

Asian Nations (ASEAN), including invited leaders from China, the U.S., South

Korea and Japan, that China would import $8 trillion of goods in the next five

years and 700 million Chinese would travel overseas. (Xinhua News Agency)

     Several rental property companies are planning to issue quasi real estate

investment trusts (REITs), with several REITs expected to be approved soon, the

Economic Information Daily reported Tuesday. With authorities increasingly

supporting the launch of new REITs, standardized public REITs available to all

investors, including individual investors, are likely to come into existence,

the newspaper said. (Economic Information Daily)

--MNI Beijing Bureau; +86 (10) 8532-5998; email: iris.ouyang@marketnews.com

--MNI BEIJING Bureau; +1 202-371-2121; email: john.carter@mni-news.com

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