Shanghai banks helping production resume

Financial institutions in Shanghai have taken measures to help enterprises resume work during the novel coronavirus epidemic.

Banks in the city have increased special credit support for key areas, actively implementing the special refinancing policies of the central bank, according to Li Jun, deputy director of the Shanghai Financial Supervision Administration.

As of February 18, banks in Shanghai have granted 90 loans totaling 1.31 billion yuan (US$187.7 million) to 48 key enterprises, with a weighted average interest rate of 2.35 percent. With a central financial subsidy of 50 percent, the actual financing costs for enterprises can be much less than 1.6 percent. Among them, national banks issued 670 million yuan in Shanghai branches while local corporate banks issued 640 million yuan.

Most of these loans were disbursed within a day, up to a maximum of two days, and were focused on key areas related to epidemic control such as material production, equipment manufacturing and procurement of medical supplies, Li said.

At the same time, the Shanghai headquarters of the central bank increased its support by using such tools as rediscounts, with a total of 110 million yuan having been rediscounted by February 18.

Meanwhile, the city has released additional funds that will be lent to companies affected by the coronavirus outbreak. To date, 54 banks in Shanghai have injected a total of 17.6 billion yuan in epidemic prevention and control loans, offering support to 1,796 enterprises, with the overall cost of loans being around 3.62 percent.

For the 4,360 enterprises seriously affected by the epidemic, about 350 million yuan in loan interest and service charges were reduced or waived.

The city has also strengthened safeguards to provide efficient services. The financial infrastructure in Shanghai makes every effort to ensure stable operation of the payment and settlement system, while financial institutions actively optimize financial services and management of cash, payment and credit reporting to guarantee the timely and efficient transfer of funds.

From January 24 to February 18, the city's financial institutions in the banking industry issued 2.8 billion yuan of new cash, to have accumulatively released cash of 9.5 billion yuan while putting in storage cash of 16.1 billion yuan.

Li also noted that banks have generally opened green channels for credit approval and cross-border business for those related to epidemic prevention and control, as well as simplified foreign exchange purchase and payment and accelerated emergency credit review and approval.

Up to February 18, Chinese and foreign-funded banks in Shanghai had handled a total of 180 special foreign exchange transactions related to epidemic prevention and control, with a total value equivalent to US$22.9 million. There were 17 transactions of epidemic prevention procurement funds remitted through free trade accounts, with the overall value reaching 19.89 million yuan.