Join Forces to Speed up and Tap the Full Potential of Existing Resources for Infrastructure REITs —— The First Yangtze River Delta REITs Forum and China REITs Forum 2022 Annual[...]

Join Forces to Speed up and Tap the Full Potential of Existing Resources for Infrastructure REITs -- The First Yangtze River Delta REITs Forum and China REITs Forum 2022 Annual Meeting Held

On December 8, the first Yangtze River Delta REITs Forum and China REITs Forum 2022 Annual Meeting was successfully held. Li Chao, Vice Chairman of the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC), Wu Qing, Executive Vice Mayor of Shanghai, Zhang Yong, former Vice Chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), Tian Guoli, Chairman of the China Construction Bank, and Qiu Yong, Chairman of the Shanghai Stock Exchange, attended the forum and delivered speeches. Officials from the NDRC, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development and other relevant departments attended the forum. With the theme of "Speed up and tap the full potential of existing resources for infrastructure REITs", this forum gathered important guests from relevant government departments, enterprises, financial institutions, and research institutions in the field of REITs to discuss the development of China's REITs market.

The forum was jointly held by the Shanghai Stock Exchange, China REITs Forum, and the Yangtze River Delta Infrastructure REITs Industry Alliance, with strong support from the Regional Cooperation Office of the Yangtze River Delta, as well as the Development and Reform Commissions of Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui, Ningbo, and other provinces and cities in the Yangtze River Delta. Events include Yangtze River Delta REITs experience sharing and exhibitions, REITs keynote speeches, and roundtable for industry experts and corporate representatives.

At the forum, officials from relevant ministries and commissions and from the Shanghai municipal government pointed out that China's infrastructure REITs product has embarked on a road of development that is not only in line with the rules of mature markets, but also suits China's conditions, and is an important measure to implement the decisions and deployment of the CPC Central Committee and to build a modern infrastructure system. To build a REITs market with Chinese characteristics, it is imperative to focus on maintaining normalized issuance, improving the market system, strengthening supervision in the interim or ex post, improving regulations and systems, and bringing into play the cooperation of all parties. The officials of the Development and Reform Commissions of the Yangtze River Delta region focused on the development and construction of the local REITs market, shared the practical experience of REITs projects in helping the transformation and development of the local economy, proposed supporting policies to promote the whole chain of market cultivation, application and issuance, and operation and management on key projects, and further promoted the pilot work of infrastructure REITs to achieve greater results. Following the theme of the forum, representatives from the REITs industry, financial institutions and enterprises put forward specific suggestions to promote the normalized issuance of REITs on subsidized rental housing, promote the pilot of new energy innovation projects, and improve the supporting mechanism of REITs, so as to develop synergy and promote the healthy and stable development of the REITs market.

Since the launch of the REITs pilot, SSE has always taken serving the real economy as the original mission of capital market construction and development, supported all parties to make full use of REITs products, and made every effort to ensure the launch of infrastructure REITs projects, contributing to the stabilization of the economy in general. Up to now, a total of 15 REIT projects have been issued on the SSE, with funds raised at 54.1 billion yuan, leveraging the investment of new projects to over 200 billion yuan. The underlying assets include warehouses and logistics, industrial parks, toll roads, ecological environmental protection and affordable rental housing in key regions such as Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei and Yangtze River Delta. Their original rights holders cover central SOEs, private enterprises, local SOEs and foreign companies. The effectiveness of infrastructure REITs in revitalizing existing assets and expanding effective investment is emerging.

The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China pointed out that high-quality development is the primary task of building a modern socialist country in all respects. REITs are an important measure for the capital market to serve the high-quality development of the real economy. As the main playground of the capital market to support and serve the real economy, the SSE has always put infrastructure REITs in the overall situation of capital market reform and development, and continuously strived to enhance the quality and efficiency of REITs in serving the real economy and national strategy. In the next step, guided by the spirit of the 20th National Congress and in accordance with the unified deployment of the CSRC, the SSE will fully implement the development requirements of Chinese modernization, create a new highland for the development of internationally competitive REITs, and serve the high-quality development of China's capital market.