Donate money and materials directly and feel troublesome, so don’t you feel at ease to donate to foundations and charity organizations? It doesn’t matter, your kindness can be done in the third way during the epidemic.
Since the " Charity Law " promulgated in 2016, the concept of "charity trust" was first proposed. In 2018, the largest charity trust in China has been established, and this new field has gradually entered the fast lane.
Charity Trust is vibrant in this epidemic relief. Its entry threshold is lower and its capital use efficiency is higher. With time and policy support, it may bring hope to eliminate the accumulated problems in China's charity and public welfare field.
targeted support
On March 10, the National Swimming Center Winter Olympics project has resumed. Xiao Chun, who participated in the Water Cube renovation project, is from Hebei Handan . After 14 days of quarantine, he walked to the familiar construction site with a mask. Although masks are still tight, on the construction site of the National Swimming Center, masks are given priority to the frontline workers who have resumed work. Among them is a love from Shenzhen Kaitaiping Charity Foundation and other units.
In order to help construction workers resume work safely, the foundation initiated the establishment of the "Construction Migrant Workers Care Charity Trust". The funds raised were used to donate masks, disinfectants and other epidemic prevention supplies to construction migrant workers on duty across the country, popularizing epidemic prevention knowledge and safe resumption of work. In addition, the group will also be given "Construction Worry-free" public welfare insurance to provide medical and accident protection. It is understood that since February 25, relevant epidemic prevention materials have been delivered to construction sites in many places such as Shenzhen, Beijing, and Hebei. Li Mengchun, project manager of Kaitaiping Charity Foundation, told " Chinese Philanthropist " that Kaitaiping is a foundation established in February 2019 that focuses on the charity of migrant workers in the construction industry. The "Construction Migrant Workers Care Charity Trust" initiated by China Construction Bank Trust and other units is the main donor of China Construction Bank Trust's high-net-worth client group, and has raised 3 million yuan in less than half a month.
According to Li Mengchun, the term of this charitable trust is ten years. "Ten years are a node of industry change. After the expiration, the charitable trust will change according to the ecological changes of the construction industry."
In addition to basic donations of medical supplies such as masks during the epidemic, the project will focus more on purchasing insurance for construction migrant workers and solving serious illness medical problems in the future, and will pay attention to the life planning and career development of this group through the foundation's coworkers' college and other vocational education and training platforms.
It is understood that there are currently more than 53 million construction migrant workers in the country. After the resumption of work, the lack of epidemic prevention materials such as disposable masks has become a major problem on the construction site. Especially for some workers participating in hospital projects under construction, they need enough epidemic prevention materials to ensure safety.
Project manager Lu Mao of a construction site in Shenzhen told reporters that there were more than 120 workers on his construction site and he had resumed work in early February. The supply of necessary epidemic prevention supplies such as masks is tight, so they have been pieced together or looking for support from brother units. Through the group channels, they recently received 2,000 disposable masks, 40 disinfectant sprays, 80 bottles of disinfectant gel and other materials donated by the "Construction Migrant Workers Care Charity Trust".
Vitality is revealed
Charity Information Disclosure Platform " Charity China " shows that as of now, there are 314 charity trust projects registered in China, involving an amount of 3350.9684 million yuan. Among them, the latest registered China Construction Bank Trust - Shiqiao Care China Kayou Charity Trust, which has a term of 120 months and a amount of 30 million yuan. All are used to care for commercial vehicle transport drivers, assist them in preventing and controlling the new coronavirus epidemic, and provide public welfare insurance protection for commercial vehicle transport drivers.
After the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, in addition to point-to-point individual donations or donations through various foundations and charity organizations, the charity donations through charitable trusts have shown vitality.
htmlOn January 26, the China Trust Industry Association issued an initiative to the entire industry to initiate the establishment of the "China Trust Industry Charitable Trust for Fighting New Pneumonia". As of February 21, a total of 14.92308 million yuan has been invested and 20 relief projects have been implemented.
It is understood that a total of 61 trust companies participated in the special charitable trust, and almost all employees participated in the trust industry of a total of 68 companies. In addition, more than 20 trust institutions have served as trustees, collaborating with foundations, local governments, etc. to establish more than 20 charitable trust projects for epidemic relief, of which the largest trust property scale of a single project is 30 million yuan. The process of
charitable trust is not complicated. Generally speaking, as long as a suitable trust company is found, the principal can sign a trust contract and entrust its property to the trust company, and the company manages and disposes according to its charitable wishes and carries out charitable activities. The trustee has the obligation to regularly disclose the property management and disposal situation. The principal may set up a supervisor to carry out necessary supervision so that the principal can clearly understand the whereabouts of his funds.
Li Min, senior partner of Beijing Zhonglun Wende Law Firm, said in an interview with China Philanthropist magazine that charitable trusts have demonstrated certain advantages in this epidemic and are conducive to the development of China's charity and charity undertakings.
lawyer Li Min said that the property of a charitable trust is independent of the manager, the principal and the trustee, and can be held accountable, compensated or even replaced by the trustee in the process. It has flexibility and professionalism, which are the advantages of a charitable trust.
Beijing Haotian Xinhe Law Firm's lawyer Li Desheng believes that the public has reflected dissatisfaction and even resistance to certain foundations during this epidemic is because of their opacity and the donors lack trust in it. "The money donated by society is equivalent to the foundation's own money after entering the foundation according to the procedures, and it is difficult for donors to hold them accountable later. Charitable trusts use the firewall designed by the system to relatively isolate funds. At the same time, through the establishment of systems such as supervisors, the principal will always be able to supervise and hold them accountable during the use of the trustee's funds."
lawyer Li Min introduced that the modern trust system originated in the UK in the 17th century and was closely related to charity from the beginning. To this day, charitable trusts in Hong Kong are still the mainstream of charitable behavior. "If we carefully summarize and study its institutional design, we may be able to find the answer to why domestic foundations are always criticized."
threshold is lower
my country's "Fund Management Regulations" and other departments clearly require that the original funds established by non-public foundations shall not be less than 2 million yuan, local public foundations shall not be less than 4 million yuan, and the establishment threshold for national public foundations shall not be less than 8 million yuan.
In comparison, my country's "Trust Law", "Charity Law" and "Charity Trust Management Measures" do not stipulate the funding threshold for the establishment of a trust, and the starting point of funds is relatively low.
There are many such cases in reality. The establishment funds for the "Qianxin Qianyuan Yiding Guardian Charity Trust" filed in Charity China on April 15, 2019 were only 5,000 yuan. The project was initiated by a Shanghai investment management company. The trustee is Wanxiang Trust. It is used to form a social guardian organization and explore and promote the combination of intentional guardianship and trust to serve people who need guardianship and help from the guardian organization.
At the same time, the operation process of establishing a charitable trust is also relatively simple. After the trust company accepts the establishment of a charitable trust, it can go to the civil affairs department at or above the county level where it is located to file.
Guangzhou Shengcun Law Firm lawyer Ling Na told China Philanthropist that charity trust has no funding threshold and the establishment method is relatively simple, which gives charity unlimited imagination.
lawyer Ling Na pointed out that from various charitable trust projects used to fight the epidemic, we can see that the group of client is diverse. In addition to the trust companies themselves, there are also many enterprises, individuals, charitable organizations and other entities. There are dozens of principals of individual charitable trusts, which just demonstrates that charitable trusts have irreplaceable advantages in gathering private charitable forces due to the lack of financial thresholds.
At the same time, the anti-epidemic charity trusts are also paying attention to a wide range of groups, covering the assistance and guarantee of front-line medical staff, comfort and care of the families of medical staff who died in the line of duty, and construction migrant workers who resume work.
An industry expert believes that the greater advantage of charitable trusts is that they are like a reservoir. Through the more professional investment of the trust institution itself, the project assets can be continuously added and maintained. In this way, the larger the fund pool, the wider the coverage of the project will be, thus forming a virtuous cycle.
Professional and efficient
in the country, how foundation funds maintain and increase their value has always been a big problem.
According to statistics from the Global Family Business Research Center of Wudaokou School of Finance, Tsinghua University, the annualized investment return rate of China Charity Foundation is less than 3%. In comparison, the 2017 Yale University fund's return on investment was as high as 11.3%.
Lawyer Li Desheng believes that compared with the mature and stable investment returns of foreign foundations, many foundations in China have the phenomenon of "sitting for nothing".
Lawyer Ling Na believes that my country's foundations have a legal obligation to preserve and increase the value of the donated property, but investment is a very professional behavior. If you are negligent, the possibility of investment losses cannot be ruled out, and the directors may also face the risk of being held accountable. This leads to the fact that in reality, some foundations only store their funds in the bank for interest, which will cause idle funds to a certain extent; some foundations have improper or blind investments, causing risks.
Ling Na introduced that mature foreign foundations are generally invested and managed by professional teams. Trust companies have long-term business trusts and have strong investment and management capabilities. If charitable trust funds still have a balance after the epidemic is over, it is not ruled out that the trust companies can invest in value preservation and appreciation according to the wishes of the principal, so that charitable behavior can last for a long time and achieve a virtuous cycle.
Li Mengchun, project manager of Shenzhen Kaitaiping Charity Foundation, said that the purpose of charitable trusts will generally be achieved by a management committee, which will have higher asset investment and risk handling capabilities than ordinary foundations. Especially for large amounts of family-style charitable trust funds. "Charity trusts can achieve the appreciation and preservation of assets through trust professionals using risky but greater returns. The foundation's ability in this regard is difficult to match."
Li Mengchun said that in addition to being legal, charitable trusts must also disclose information and be subject to supervision in accordance with the requirements of the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission. In addition, charitable trust agreements themselves are more complex and are subject to more legal constraints.
"Charity trust is more like a contractual relationship. If the trustee violates the client's wishes, he can be held accountable during and afterwards. For foundations, each foundation will have a guarantee clause in the charter. Even if it does not meet the donor's wishes, as long as the donor is ultimately used for charity and public welfare, it is understandable. This makes the donor often feel scratching the surface of the implementation of his or her wishes in the foundation." An industry expert said.
system absent
16 The Charity Law, which was implemented on September 1, 2016, proposed the concept of "charity trust" from the legislative level for the first time, and stipulated in the terms that the management methods of charitable trusts can be registered by the "civil affairs department". Charitable trusts have since entered the fast lane of development.
In May 2017, Midea founder He Xiangjian established the "CITIC-He Xiangjian Charity Foundation 2017 Shunde Community Charity Trust" with a cash scale of nearly 500 million. The trusted property and income are jointly served as trustees by CITIC Trust and Guangdong He Xiangjian Charity Foundation. The purpose of trust property and income is to build a more humane and attractive Shunde community.
In October 2018, the largest charitable trust in China, the "Lu Guanqiu San Rural Fuzhi Fund Charity Trust", was established. Its entrusted property is 100% of the equity of Wanxiang San Rural Group Co., Ltd., with a corresponding capital contribution of 600 million yuan. These weather vane events such as
have driven the attention and participation of charitable trusts in the field of charity and public welfare in China.
Li Mengchun, project manager of Shenzhen Kaitaiping Charity Foundation, said that charitable trusts are more flexible in asset absorption than traditional foundations, making it easier to absorb more foreign currency assets, such as house rent.In practice, executives of corporate executives such as Alibaba and Tencent also have charitable trusts to transfer equity returns.
However, tax issues are currently a hurdle that restricts the development of charitable trusts.
Lingna lawyer said that during this epidemic, countries allow full deductions to cash and items donated by enterprises and individuals through public welfare organizations or government agencies for the epidemic. Unfortunately, my country has not yet established a tax system that matches trusts, and the tax preferential measures for charitable trusts are not yet clear.
lawyer Li Desheng said that compared with the foundation's donation tax exemption qualification, the trust company currently does not have the tax deduction qualification. Since the trust company is not a charitable organization, it is unable to issue donations to the donor, and the donor cannot obtain tax deductions.
At the same time, real estate and equity are established as trustee assets, and can only be completed through transaction transfer, which causes high tax and fee expenditures for donors, which are obstacles to the use of charitable trusts to carry out charitable and public welfare activities.
Lawyer Li Min believes that the most urgent task is to provide equal tax reduction and exemption support to charitable trusts and foundations from the legal level, and equal charitable tax exemption for new things such as real estate and equity in charitable trusts is also a problem that needs to be solved in the next step of legislation.
Ling Na lawyer suggested that charitable trust itself should also be strengthened in the implementation of the system, such as how to implement the supervisor system in charitable trusts, and the agreement should be more detailed.
In order to avoid the shortcomings of charitable trusts, lawyer Ling Na believes that in actual operations, charitable trusts can be combined with foundation cooperation and government linkage, etc., to form a joint force of multiple parties. The Charity Law also clearly stipulates that charitable organizations can serve as trustees of charitable trusts.
In practice, there have been a large number of cases of charitable organizations and trust companies as co-trusts. For example, Tianjin Trust and Tianjin Charity Association jointly established as trustees, charity trust for the love and education assistance charity trust for the poverty alleviation and poverty established as trustees, Shaanxi Guotou Trust and Xi'an Charity Association jointly established as trustees, etc. During this anti-epidemic rescue, many charitable trust projects related to the epidemic in various places also had the phenomenon of trustees being local charitable and public welfare organizations.
"The epidemic has made charitable trusts known to more people. If appropriate tax preferential policies can be given, I believe that more people can be gathered to invest in charity and public welfare, and promote the development of charity and public welfare in our country." Ling Na said.
