China’s Debt Crackdown Is Driving Borrowers Into Riskier Territory
Beijing’s game of Whac-A-Mole against financial risks is sending some borrowers into darker corners
China’s crackdown on debt is driving some companies to a murkier form of financing as it gets harder to secure bank loans or tap the bond market.
New loans from so-called trusts, firms that raise money from individuals and corporations to plow into riskier areas of the economy, reached 882.3 billion yuan ($129.5 billion) in the first four months of this year, according to data from the People’s Bank of China, nearly five times as much as the same period in 2016.
Trust firms, which often charge borrowers higher rates than banks, occupy a middle ground between banking and asset management. They are licensed and loosely regulated by China’s banking watchdog, but they lack some of banks’ protections, such as government deposit insurance, and they have more flexibility to invest in risky areas than banks do.