China to ease foreign investments curbs

BEIJING (Reuters) — China will eliminate all restrictions on foreign investments not included in its self-styled “negative lists,” a vice commerce minister said on Tuesday, and also will “neither explicitly nor implicitly” force foreign investors and companies to transfer technologies.

The statement to a news conference in Beijing by Wang Shouwen signaled possible upcoming directives.

Technology transfers have been a major source of tension between China and the United States, which have been embroiled in a trade war for over a year.

The ‘negative lists’ specify industries in which investors, foreign or domestic, are restricted or prohibited.

“We will move faster to open up the financial industry,” said Wang, eliminating all restrictions on the scope of business for foreign banks, securities companies and fund managers.

Policies will also be fine-tuned to ensure foreign and domestic players have equal market access to manufacturing new-energy vehicles, he said.

The new measures are intended to ensure stable foreign investment and create a transparent, predictable investment environment, Wang said.

The U.S.-China Business

Council said forced technology transfer requirements and investment restrictions that required joint ventures were a concern for many of its more than 200 member companies.

“We are encouraged by the vice minister’s statement on eliminating forced technology transfer requirements in the China market,” said Jake Parker, the group’s senior vice president. “We look forward to these new liberalizations quickly resulting in transparent regulatory reviews that lead to licenses granted after narrowly defined review timelines.”

Chief U.S. and Chinese trade negotiators talked on the phone recently and will speak again soon, Geng Shuang, China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, told a separate news conference. He did not give a timeframe.

U.S. President Donald Trump agreed this month to cancel an Oct. 15 hike in tariffs on $250 billion in Chinese goods as part of a tentative agreement on agricultural purchases, increased access to China’s financial services markets, better protections for intellectual property rights and a currency pact.

Leaders of the world’s two biggest economies are working to agree on the text for a “Phase one” trade agreement announced by Trump on Oct. 11.