China's central State-owned enterprises (SOEs) are expected to profit a combined one trillion yuan ($135.14 billion) this year, up from the 920 billion yuan predicted earlier and bringing the central SOEs assets total to 13 trillion yuan, according to the Shanghai Securities News.

Li Rongrong, minister of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC), said Saturday at the China Entrepreneur Summit 2007 that China's central SOEs' assets total exceeded 12 trillion yuan as of the end of 2006.

Between 2004 and 2006, central SOEs' combined assets grew to 12 trillion yuan from 7.13 trillion yuan, an annual growth of 1.3 trillion yuan and equal to the total assets of PetroChina, one of China's biggest oil producers, Li said at the forum.

The minister also said central SOEs demonstrated improving competitiveness during the period. In 2003, only six Chinese enterprises ranked among the world's top 500 firms, but by 2006, the number had increased to 16.

Statistics from SASAC show that total profit of China's 445 SOEs rose to 889.1 billion yuan last year, up from 761.6 billion yuan in 2005.

The 417 major SOEs reported a 33.5-percent rise in profits for the first seven months this year, with their combined profits rising to 661.5 billion yuan in the January-July period, from 495.5 billion yuan a year earlier, according to SASAC statistics.

To deeply reform its central SOEs, Li said earlier last month China will speed up the process to encourage eligible central SOEs or their main businesses to become fully listing in three years.

(China Daily December 10, 2007)