The China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone (SHFTZ) launched a "model company" selection campaign in March 2017, aiming to highlight its innovation and reform achievements over the past years. The six-month long event invited more than 80,000 SHFTZ-registered companies to sign up via self-recommendation or via recommendation from others.

After publication, application, on-site inspection, experts' voting and online voting, the campaign selected the top 10 model companies and six sample enterprises, covering foreign-funded, State-owned and private companies, which served as examples of successfully utilizing SHFTZ's innovative measures to enhance growth and development.

In addition, the SHFTZ has compiled a case book of first model companies for its policy innovation, with the hope of encouraging more companies to turn the Zone's innovative measures and preferential policies into their own advantages and growth points.

About Citibank (China) Co, Shanghai Branch

The Shanghai Branch of Citibank (China) Co is among the first foreign banks that were approved to settle in the Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone in September 2013.

It has been actively taking part in the financial reform in the SHFTZ and encouraging multinationals in the zone to set up regional clearing center, asset management center and financial shared service center, which greatly helps reduce their cost.

Thanks to the preferential financial policies in the zone and Citi Bank's own global electronic platform, the Shanghai branch launched an automatic bidirectional cross-border RMB capital pool that enables the customer to make receipts and payments without submitting documents and receiving the approval of every single deal. It further improves the capital liquidity and cash management efficiency.

The real-time receipts and payment with RMB can be made between Mainland China, Hong Kong, Singapore and London, which will facilitate the internationalization of RMB.

It is also engaged in cross-border RMB centralized receipts and payments of and netting settlement, which enables the enterprises in the SHFTZ to centralize its participant member enterprises' cross-border settlement under current accounts.

Multinationals in the zone can allocate and transfer cash between Chinese and overseas settlement centers within a certain amount, which helps minimize the use of foreign debt quotas and reduce registration and filing procedures.

As the subject of separate accounting unit, Citibank offers its customers funding at lower costs via overseas capital market, including traditional loans and various structural financing solutions. These services expand the financing channels and lower the costs, providing a new cross-border financing platform for real economy.

Its packaged financial solutions such as the bidirectional cross-border RMB capital pool and centralized receipts and payment with RMB have brought convenience to the use of funds.