BEIJING, April 3 (Xinhua) -- Upon removal of foreign ownership limits since April 1, foreign asset management (AM) giants such as BlackRock, Inc. and Neuberger Berman have filed applications for setting up wholly-owned publicly-offered fund management firms in China, reported Securities Times Thursday.
By far, the application materials submitted respectively by BlackRock Financial Management and Neuberger Berman Investment Advisers LLC have been accepted by China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC), the sector regulator.
Analysts said that their moves marked a likely new era for China's publicly-offered fund field where foreign and domestic AM institutions begin to compete on the same basis.
Geraldine Buckingham, global head of corporate strategy at BlackRock, Inc., attributed their application filing on April 1 to foreseeable fast growth of capital market assets in China, saying they believed China is one of the most promising markets over the long run.
As the biggest AM group around the world, BlackRock, Inc. managed as high as 7.43 trillion U.S. dollars of assets globally by December 31, 2019, including stocks, fixed-income products, cash management products, alternative investment, real estate and etc.
In future, BlackRock, Inc. will continue to develop its businesses and local investment capability in China, said Geraldine Buckingham.
Apart from BlackRock, Inc., Neuberger Berman also applied for founding a publicly-offered fund management firm, saying the company has always been optimistic about the Chinese economy and related business opportunities and kept increasing its businesses in the country.
By the end of 2019, Neuberger Berman had 106.1 billion U.S. dollars of stock assets, 160.4 billion U.S. dollars of fixed-income assets and 89.2 billion U.S. dollars of alternative assets under its management.
In China, Neuberger Berman's business unit has filed eight private equity funds by the end of March.
Other foreign AM giants such as Vanguard Group, Inc. and Fidelity International also expressed their willingness to issue publicly-offered funds in China. (Edited by Duan Jing with Xinhua Silk Road, duanjing@xinhua.org)
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