China Tells

China’s Financial institutions are now world’s No.2 in terms of scale only after USA. In fact China is even bigger than USA in some aspects, such as the size of the bank (See Graph from Chinatells). However, the decision making system in China’s financial institutions are a complex mystery to outsiders (See Article from Economist). It seems that the heads of big 5 state owned banks are mostly government officials and have a political agenda. Some of them might be shifted between competitors due to political consideration. China’s bank lending mandate looks more like a government verdict rather than a market behavior. On top of the commercial banks, there are government entities such as China’s Bank Regulatory Committee, State Administration of Foreign Exchange and People’s Bank of China. To figure out who does what and who is the boss appears to be a mission impossible for western observers.

中国的金融系统在最近几年突飞猛进，几大银行，保险公司和政府投资公司的规模都在世界上数一数二。然而中国金融系统内部的决策系统却是异常复杂，让人摸不着头脑。在商业银行之上，有各种国家管理机构，很多商业银行的总裁身兼政府职能。要理清其中的脉络和决策系统，几乎是一项不可能的任务。