China's central state firms report strong profit growth in first two months

China's centrally-administered state-owned enterprises (SOEs) reported double-digit growth in business revenue and profit in the first two months in 2018, state assets regulator said Saturday.

A press conference on reform and development of state-owned enterprises is held on the sidelines of the first session of the 13th National People's Congress in Beijing on March 10, 2018. [Photo: Xinhua/Li Xin]

During January and February, centrally administered SOEs made a total of 206.67 billion yuan (about 32.63 billion U.S. dollars) in profit, up 22.6 percent year on year, said Xiao Yaqing, head of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC).

Total revenue of the central SOEs was up 10.9 percent year on year to 4.1 trillion yuan in the first two months, Xiao said at a press conference on the sidelines of the first session of the 13th National People's Congress. 

Xiao said he is fully confident in China's economic growth and the performance of SOEs in this year.

In 2017, centrally-administered SOEs made 1.4 trillion yuan in profit, up 15.2 percent, while their total revenue was up 13.3 percent to 26.4 trillion yuan.

The centrally-administered SOEs in secondary industry accounted for 61.7 percent of profits last year, Xiao said.

Progress has been made in supply-side structural reform. Last year, a total of 1,200 "zombie enterprises" and companies with particular operating difficulty were handled properly, reducing losses up to 163.4 billion yuan in total.

Some of "zombie enterprises" would go bankrupt directly while some would be merged, entrusted to other enterprises, or helped out by the government.

As the central government has been restructuring central SOEs to improve their efficiency and competitiveness, the number of centrally administered SOEs has dropped to 98 from 117 five years ago.