China's total banking assets leaped to 39.19 trillion yuan (US$4.9 trillion) at the end of March, a 19.2 percent increase from a year ago, reported the banking watchdog on Monday.

The Big Four state banks -- Bank of China, China Construction Bank, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China and the Agricultural Bank of China -- saw assets jump by 17.4 percent, reaching a combined sum of 20.8 trillion yuan (US$2.596 trillion) which is more than half of the banking industry's total.

The China Banking Regulatory Commission also revealed in its latest report that the 13 smaller national shareholder banks posted 6.07 trillion yuan (US$757.6 billion) in assets -- an increase of 26.9 percent.

China's city and rural commercial banks, rural credit cooperatives and other banking institutions also reported rapid growth of assets.

However, Chinese banking institutions' debts rose 18.6 percent from a year earlier to 37.45 trillion yuan (US$4.67 trillion) at the end of last month, the CBRC said.

By the end of March, the country's four asset management companies had either written off or recovered 866.34 billion yuan (US$108 billion) in non-performing assets from banks.

Only 180.56 billion yuan (US$22.5 billion), just over one-fifth of the total was recovered in cash, the commission said.

The management companies -- Huarong, Cinda, Orient and Great Wall -- were set up in 1999 to manage a mountain of problem assets transferred from China's Big Four state banks.

(Xinhua News Agency April 25, 2006)