China is desperate to solve several problems it has due to its debt to GDP ratio being north of 300 percent. It may have found a pretty unconventional one by letting companies become banks, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal.
With profits headed south, heavily indebted Chinese heavy-machinery giant Sany Heavy Industries said this week it won approval to set up a bank in the Hunan Province city of Changsha. With 3 billion yuan ($450 million) of registered capital, it will be a relatively large institution as Chinese city-based banks go. Sany plans to join forces with a pharmaceutical company and an aluminum company.
Sany already operates an insurance and finance division with the goal of internal financing and insurance services for clients.
