In January of this year, the Ministry of Finance introduced a package of fiscal and financial policies designed to stimulate domestic demand. Focusing on two key areas—invigorating private investment and boosting household consumption—the package included four measures to support small and medium-sized enterprises through interest subsidies and credit guarantees, alongside one policy providing interest subsidies for personal consumption loans.
Following the central government's announcement, Guangdong Province has released its "Comprehensive Policy Guidelines for Fiscal-Financial Coordination to Benefit Enterprises and the Public." This initiative combines a suite of fiscal and financial tools, including fund guidance, loan interest subsidies, and risk-sharing mechanisms. Notably, manufacturing and other eligible enterprises can receive annual interest subsidies of up to 20 million yuan on their loans.
Recently, the Guangdong Strategic Emerging Industry Investment Guidance Fund Co., Ltd., wholly owned by the Guangdong Provincial Department of Finance, was officially established. This fund has a total planned scale of 100 billion yuan, with an initial phase of 50 billion yuan.
The fund establishes a "long-term capital for long-term investment" policy framework. Operating as a unified provincial-level platform for government investment fund contributions and management, the guidance fund adopts a corporate structure with a perpetual existence. This establishes a mechanism for stable, long-term fiscal input and the recycling of returned capital for reinvestment, providing more patient capital for the development of Guangdong's modern industrial system.
A new three-tier architecture—"Guidance Fund, Mother Fund, Sub-fund"—has been established to restructure and strengthen the provincial fund ecosystem. This structure is designed to better leverage the multiplier effect of fiscal funds, attract private capital to stimulate nongovernmental investment, and enhance provincial-level coordination. By using the provincial guidance fund as an anchor, the system strategically plans and advances the entire provincial fund landscape, ensuring effective synergy between local capital, industrial policy, development plans, and investment layouts.
The guidance fund introduces innovative management mechanisms to activate market investment dynamics. These include a fault-tolerant and exemption mechanism, long-cycle performance evaluation, a "horse racing" model for capital allocation, categorized exit strategies, coordination between provincial and municipal levels, resource sharing, post-investment management, and alignment with industrial policies. The aim is for the provincial guidance fund to drive the optimization of management across government investment funds at all levels within the province, stimulating internal momentum for investment and leveraging greater private capital into innovation.
An official from the Provincial Department of Finance stated that, to implement the "Several Measures for Further Stimulating Market Vitality and Accelerating the Construction of a Modern Industrial System in Guangdong," the province is rolling out an interest subsidy policy for loans taken by manufacturing and high-tech enterprises. Eligible loans will receive a subsidy covering 35% of the loan interest rate, with a maximum annual fiscal subsidy support of 20 million yuan.
The subsidy targets manufacturing enterprises registered in the province and valid high-tech enterprises, with loan proceeds focused on areas of the real economy such as factory construction, equipment purchase, technological transformation, and scientific R&D. The policy implementation follows a "bank application on behalf, zero physical trips for enterprises" model. It will be handled uniformly by the Guangdong branches of 21 national banks, as well as local city commercial banks and rural commercial banks, with centralized reporting each quarter. This ensures subsidy funds are delivered directly and swiftly, achieving the goal of "subsidizing all that qualify, benefiting all that are eligible," thereby encouraging enterprises to invest confidently, willingly, and to root their innovative development in Guangdong.
Guangdong is building a full-chain support system through coordinated central and local policies. While fully implementing central government policies, the province emphasizes the organic linkage and synergistic effects between provincial and central measures, creating a combined policy force greater than the sum of its parts.
On one hand, there is a focus on complementary target support and comprehensive chain coverage. Central policies primarily emphasize broad-based support for small, micro, and medium-sized enterprises and the consumption side. In contrast, Guangdong concentrates on the core pillars of manufacturing and high-tech enterprises. This creates a tiered combination across industrial levels, enterprise sizes, and financing purposes, jointly constructing a comprehensive support system that spans from production to consumption, from startups to leading enterprises, and from equipment investment to R&D expenditure.
On the other hand, there is strengthened tool coordination and mechanism linkage. The provincial guidance fund, together with central interest subsidy and guarantee programs, forms a trinity support system of "equity + debt + guarantee." The fund addresses the challenge of "investing early and small," the interest subsidy policy reduces corporate debt costs, and the guarantee plan mitigates bank risks, collectively tackling issues such as financial institutions' reluctance to lend and enterprises' unwillingness to invest.
Furthermore, mechanisms promoted by Guangdong, such as adjusting slow allocations and supplementing fast ones, and quarterly disbursements, align closely with central government advocated practices like "advance allocation + settlement" and "joint review and mutual recognition." This significantly shortens the policy fulfillment cycle and enhances the sense of benefit for market entities.
The official from the Provincial Department of Finance indicated that the province will continue to deepen policy coordination between central and local governments, improve mechanisms related to policy implementation and fund pre-allocation, and strive to ensure provincial policies synergize effectively with central interest subsidy policies. The goal is to precisely and efficiently channel fiscal funds and financial resources to the areas and groups within the real economy that need them most.
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