Data source: The Political Bureau meeting of the CPC Central Committee held by the Ministry of Finance on July 28 proposed to make good use of local government special bond funds and support local governments in making full use of special debt limits. How was the overall issuance

Data source: Ministry of Finance

html The Political Bureau meeting of the CPC Central Committee held on July 28 proposed to make good use of local government special bond funds and support local governments in making full use of special debt limits. How was the overall issuance and use of special bonds in the first half of the year? How can local governments and relevant departments further strengthen coordination in the second half of the year, make full use of special debt limits, and promote the formation of physical workload? The reporter conducted the interview.

Stable growth, benefiting people's livelihood, and making up for shortcomings

html On August 2, on the top of the pier 70 meters above the sea, the key control project of Shenzhen-Zhong Channel and the Lingdingyang Bridge east anchorage were successfully pushed up , staged millimeter-level integration. The Shenzhen-Zhongshan Corridor is another super cross-ocean cluster project in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and is expected to be completed and open to traffic in 2024. In order to ensure construction funding needs, a total of 4.73 billion yuan of special bonds have been issued for this project so far, with a new issuance of 377 million yuan this year.

This year, the issuance and use of special bonds, as an important tool for implementing proactive fiscal policies, has accelerated. From January to July, local governments across the country have issued a total of 3.47 trillion yuan in new special bonds (including part of the carryover quota for 2021). The quota for project construction has basically been issued, supporting more than 23,800 projects in total.

Special bonds effectively play the role of government investment in leveraging social capital -

html From November to July, more than 250 billion yuan of special bond funds have been arranged in various regions to be used as capital for major projects such as railways and toll roads.

Special bonds will better optimize the investment structure, benefit people's livelihood, make up for shortcomings, and strengthen the foundation -

Sichuan Province implemented 12.3 billion yuan of special bond funds for water conservancy construction in the first half of the year, eliminating 46 large and medium-sized water conservancy projects and dangerous reservoirs in the province The construction of risk reinforcement and other projects has been accelerated, improved in quality and efficiency, and the total investment scale of large and medium-sized water conservancy projects under construction is the highest in history.

Hebei Province issued 192 billion yuan in special bonds in the first half of the year, focusing on supporting the construction of nearly 1,600 public welfare projects such as the Xiongan New Area, Langfang Airport Economic Zone, and the affordable housing project. Among them, 707 projects and 64.9 billion yuan have been invested in people's livelihood areas such as hospitals, schools, and affordable housing projects to further supplement the infrastructure shortcomings in the field of social undertakings.

Foshan, Guangdong, issued more than 140 million yuan in special bonds in the first half of the year to support the infrastructure construction of the Sanlong Bay Nanhai Industrial Park, attracting a number of corporate headquarters and technology-based companies to settle in, laying a solid foundation for the construction of digital economy and headquarters economic industrial clusters.

Long Xiaoyan, associate researcher at the Chinese Academy of Fiscal Sciences, said that according to the policy, in addition to the original nine major fields such as transportation and energy, special bonds can also support the construction of new infrastructure, new energy and other projects that will increase stamina and improve the level of the industry this year; Support the construction of urban pipeline network construction and other projects that benefit people's livelihood and relieve people's worries; support the construction of agricultural and rural modernization, grain storage and logistics facilities to ensure food supply, and other projects that complement shortcomings and strengths and weaknesses. Statistics from

show that of the 3.41 trillion yuan in special bonds issued in the first half of the year, 1,169.1 billion yuan was used to support municipal construction and industrial park infrastructure, 577.7 billion yuan for transportation infrastructure, 638.9 billion yuan for social undertakings, 529.6 billion yuan for affordable housing projects, Agriculture, forestry and water conservancy are worth 283.2 billion yuan, ecology and environmental protection are worth 127.6 billion yuan, and energy, urban and rural cold chain logistics infrastructure are worth 80.2 billion yuan. The role of special bond funds in benefiting people's livelihood and making up for shortcomings has become increasingly apparent.

Improve the efficiency of issuance and use

According to data from the Ministry of Finance, the national special debt limit this year is 21,818.5 billion yuan; as of the end of June this year, the national special debt balance was 20,264.5 billion yuan. From this, it is estimated that the remaining space of the special debt limit is 1,554 billion yuan. Luo Zhiheng, chief economist of

Guangdong Securities, believes that making good use of the special debt limit is mainly to solve the problem of insufficient fiscal funds in the fourth quarter that may be caused by the rapid development of infrastructure this year. There is no need to increase the limit but within the framework of established limit management. use.

The issuance of new special bond quotas in 2022 has reached 95%, and the remaining 5% is basically used to supplement the capital of small and medium-sized banks. The "space" in the quota mainly comes from the remainder in 2021.Luo Zhiheng said that the remaining quotas in the six provinces and cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian, and Shandong totaled 619.96 billion yuan, accounting for about 40% of all remaining quotas of local governments. “Making good use of the quotas can appropriately alleviate the financial pressure in some regions and promote Infrastructure."

Luo Guosan, director of the Fixed Asset Investment Department of the National Development and Reform Commission, said a few days ago that he has recently organized local governments to submit the third batch of special bond projects, and a list of projects has been screened and prepared for feedback to local governments.

While making full use of the special debt limit, it is also necessary to promote the issued special bonds to form physical workload as soon as possible -

"Accelerate the expenditure and use of special bonds, firstly, to stabilize investment and then stabilize growth, and secondly, to stabilize some employment In particular, the employment of migrant workers is conducive to boosting the confidence and expectations of market entities," Luo Zhiheng said.

"The faster the expenditure progresses, the higher the marginal effect, and the more obvious the effect of stimulating the economy." Bai Jingming, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Fiscal Sciences, emphasized.

First-level inspector of the Budget Department of the Ministry of Finance Song Qichao said that the financial department will urge local governments to allocate special bond funds in a timely manner, consolidate the responsibilities of project units, and promote the special bonds to form physical workload as soon as possible.

Various places have pressed the "fast forward button" on the use of special bond funds. For example, the Hebei Provincial Department of Finance has improved the bond disbursement package linkage mechanism to achieve "point-to-point" analysis and dispatching of cities, counties, and projects, and timely coordination and resolution of existing difficulties; the Guangdong Provincial Department of Finance has comprehensively improved the efficiency of the allocation of bond funds on-lending . All issuance funds will be allocated to cities and counties on the day they are collected, achieving "zero retention and no overnight retention" of city and county bond funds in the provincial treasury.

There is great potential to continue to amplify the role of special bond funds in leveraging and pulling social capital -

In the first half of the year, the proportion of special bond funds used as capital for major projects was approximately 7%. According to policy regulations, for major projects supported by special bonds, in line with the central government's major decision-making arrangements, and with a large demonstration effect, the upper limit of the proportion of special bonds allowed to be used as capital is 25%. Making full use of this policy can continue to unleash the vitality of social investment.

The Sichuan Provincial Budget Report disclosed that Sichuan will issue 185.4 billion yuan of new local government special bonds in 2021. Special bonds will be used as project capital and portfolio financing policies to stimulate investment of about 500 billion yuan.

The " Package of Policies and Measures to Solidly Stabilize the Economy" issued by the State Council requires that the Ministry of Finance, in conjunction with the People's Bank of China and China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission, guide commercial banks to provide supporting financing support to qualified special bond project construction entities and provide good credit Effective connection of funds and special bond funds.

Long Xiaoyan believes that in the next step, the development and reform, finance, environmental protection, auditing and other departments will coordinate to actively ensure the supporting factors such as land and energy consumption for special bond projects, and create an environment for special bond project application and approval for social capital and financial institutions. Stabilize expectations while strengthening information Coordinate and communicate, promote the docking and interaction of projects and funds, "stimulate the enthusiasm of social capital for special bond projects, and jointly expand effective investment."

Strengthen risk management

The larger the issuance volume and the faster issuance and use rhythm, the more strict control must be Debt risk.

To this end, the financial system has established a sound incentive mechanism. For example, we implement expenditure progress reporting and early warning, actively promote penetrating monitoring of special bond projects, timely grasp project construction status, fund utilization progress, etc., and report monthly special bond issuance and expenditure utilization progress in various locations. Some provincial finance departments have suspended the issuance of special bonds in prefectures and cities with outstanding management problems in the use and management of special bonds to promote the compliant use of bond funds as soon as possible.

The relevant person in charge of the Ministry of Finance recently stated that the current risk of repaying special bonds on schedule is controllable. "In accordance with relevant policies and regulations, special bonds are repaid through local government fund revenue and special revenue, and refinancing bonds are allowed to be issued to repay maturing principals for qualified projects. As of the end of July, the principal of special bonds that have matured this year is 533.2 billion Yuanjun has been repaid in full and on schedule, and the repayment risk is controllable." He said that in the next step, the Ministry of Finance will make full use of the relatively small window period for local government bond issuance in the near future to complete the closing work of new special bond issuance in 2022.In accordance with the "zero tolerance" requirement, local governments are urged to speed up the management of special bond projects and effectively prevent special bond risks. At the same time, we will study and guide local governments to make full use of special debt limits, revitalize debt limit space in accordance with the law, and play an effective investment role.

Source: People’s Daily