In the past four years since the establishment of China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Zone (SHFTZ), over 49,000 enterprises have newly registered in the zone, and the average monthly registered enterprises number has grown by five times compared to before the zone was established.

More than 80 percent of the newly registered enterprises in SHFTZ are active. Nearly 40,000 of these newly registered enterprises are domestically invested, and over 8,700 are foreign-invested. The proportion of foreign-invested companies increased to nearly 20 percent from 5 percent at the zone's preliminary stage. Almost all the new foreign-invested companies were established through filing.

To date, a total of 49,000 free trade accounts have been opened, with business involving over 130 countries and regions, 27,000 domestic and overseas enterprises. The paid-in foreign capital was $16.7 billion, twice of the zone's total in the past twenty years before SHFTZ was established.

In the first half of 2017, SHFTZ's imports and exports value of SFTZ increased significantly, reaching 642.7 billion yuan ($100.26 billion), up 17.9 percent year-on-year, accounting for 41.4 percent of the total foreign trade value of Shanghai in the same period.

Among them, the imports totaled 446.02 billion yuan, an increase of 22.6 percent year-on-year, accounting for 48.1 percent of Shanghai's total imports value. The exports grew by 8.5 percent year-on-year to 196.68 billion yuan, accounting for 31.4 percent of the total in Shanghai.

From January to June in 2017, the cross-border RMB settlement totaled 673.58 billion yuan in the zone, accounting for 59.87 percent of the city's total, while helping further promote the internalization of RMB.

A total of 668 enterprises have conducted cross-border RMB cash pool business since the policy was issued, with total revenue and expenditure of 849.77 billion yuan. The enterprises' cross-border transaction costs were greatly reduced.

The construction of SHFTZ has promoted the economic development of Pudong New Area in a sustained, stable and rapid way. The regional GDP of Pudong has continuously maintained a growth rate of above 8 percent. The growth of paid-in foreign investment has hit 37 percent.

There are a total of 274 regional headquarters of transnational companies in the new area, as well as 221 certified foreign-funded research and development centers.

Fruitful results were achieved in the services for the construction of the Belt and Road Initiative. Over 3,000 projects were achieved with the countries involved in the Belt and Road Initiative. The import and export trade volume witnessed a growth of 22 percent, accounting for one fifth of the new area's total imports and exports.