China's private sector companies miss out on credit boom

China’s private sector has missed out on the country’s credit boom over the past eight years, a new study has shown, despite Beijing’s efforts to rebalance the economy away from state-dominated heavy industry, the Financial Times reports. Private sector debt has fallen from 48% of total assets in 2008 to 35% in 2015, according to economists at Beijing University. Over the same period, state sector debt rose slightly to 53%, even though China’s state-owned enterprises are only two-thirds as profitable as their private sector counterparts. SOE investment surged in the first half of this year while investment by private enterprises has continued to fall. In place of bank loans, private companies invest using retained earnings — a strategy that has led to private sector investment dropping off as China’s economy slows.