Notice from the General Office of the State Council on Issuing the ‘Implementation Plan for Coordinating the Construction of Financing Credit Service Platforms to Improve the Financing Convenience Level of Small and Micro Enterprises’

State Council Office Issue [2024] No. 15

To the People’s Governments of all provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities directly under the Central Government, and to all ministries and commissions of the State Council, and to all directly subordinate institutions:

The ‘Implementation Plan for Coordinating the Construction of Financing Credit Service Platforms to Improve the Financing Convenience Level of Small and Micro Enterprises’ has been approved by the State Council and is now issued to you for serious implementation.

General Office of the State Council

March 28, 2024

(This document has been abridged)

Coordinated Construction of Financing Credit Service Platforms

Implementation Plan to Enhance Financing Convenience for Small and Micro Enterprises

The financing credit service platform is a comprehensive platform established under the guidance of government departments. It aggregates credit information across sectors and fields to provide credit information services for financial institutions’ enterprise financing activities. It plays a crucial role in solving the problem of information asymmetry between banks and enterprises and in reducing the financing costs for businesses. To implement the decisions and deployments of the Central Committee of the Communist Party and the State Council, better coordinate the construction of financing credit service platforms, improve the inclusive financing service system based on credit information, and effectively enhance the financing convenience level for small and micro enterprises, this implementation plan has been formulated.

I. Overall Requirements

Guided by Xi Jinping’s Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, fully implement the spirit of the Party’s 20th National Congress, thoroughly, accurately, and comprehensively apply the new development concepts, accelerate the construction of a new development pattern, strive to promote high-quality development, improve the data foundation system, increase the coordination efforts in building financing credit service platforms, perfect the mechanism for the aggregation and sharing of credit information, advance the ‘Credit Easy Loan’ initiative, deepen the application of credit big data, ensure information security and the legitimate rights and interests of business entities, prompt financial institutions to change their business philosophies, optimize financial services, and control financial risks, providing high-quality financial services especially for small and micro enterprises.

II. Increase Coordination Efforts for Platform Construction

(i) Clarify the channels for the aggregation and sharing of credit information. Strengthen the ‘main hub’ function of the national credit information sharing platform (hereinafter referred to as the credit information platform) for the aggregation and sharing of credit information, and enhance the data sharing of the national financial credit information base database. The credit information platform unifies the collection of various types of credit information and shares it with departments and localities as needed. Relying on the credit information platform, construct a national financing credit service platform and connect it with local financing credit service platforms to form a nationwide integrated platform network. This serves as the ‘sole outlet’ for providing public credit information services to financial institutions, although the provision of credit information services in specific fields by departments to financial institutions is not restricted by this. Adhere to the financial infrastructure positioning of the national financial credit information base database, providing high-quality professional credit services to financial institutions.

(ii) Strengthen the integration and unified management of local platforms. Integrate local financing credit service platforms that are redundant or inefficient, keeping only one provincial platform per province in principle, and no more than one platform at the city or county level. All local platforms should be unified into the national integrated platform network, managed through a list-based approach to reduce redundant construction and waste of resources. The National Development and Reform Commission is responsible for coordinating the construction of financing credit service platforms and promoting the integration and unified management of local platforms. All regions should complete the platform integration by the end of December 2024, orderly managing asset transfer, data handover, and personnel placement, ensuring that platform services are not affected during the integration period.

(iii) Enhance guidance for the construction of local platforms. Standardize the criteria for local financing credit service platforms to access the national integrated platform network, optimize credit information services, and promote the standard and healthy development of local platforms. Relying on urban credit monitoring and the creation of social credit system demonstration zones, strengthen guidance on improving platform data quality. Fully utilize the existing counterpart support mechanisms to further deepen cooperation in constructing financing credit service platforms between the eastern and the central and western regions, and accelerate the ‘Credit Easy Loan’ initiative in the central and western regions.

III. Optimize the credit information collection and sharing mechanism

(iv) Clarify the scope of credit information collection and sharing. Based on the actual needs of financial institutions for credit information, further expand the scope of credit information collection and sharing to include key personnel information of enterprises, various qualification information, import and export information, etc., into the credit information collection and sharing list (see attachment). The National Development and Reform Commission will lead the timely update of this list. All regions should fully utilize the role of local financing credit service platforms to break down data barriers, legally and regulatively increase the collection and sharing of credit information outside the list, compile provincial credit information collection and sharing lists in line with local realities, and effectively expand the breadth and depth of data collection and sharing.

(v) Improve the quality and efficiency of credit information sharing. Increase ‘total-to-total’ sharing efforts for credit information already managed centrally by national departments. Strengthen collaborative governance of data quality, standardize data collection standards, timely conduct credit information repair, and improve information update and maintenance mechanisms to ensure data is true, accurate, and complete. Address issues such as insufficient data sharing frequency, inadequate interface capacity, and insufficient sharing of certain public utility information to further enhance the efficiency of credit information sharing. According to the needs of data providing units, regularly feedback on data usage and effectiveness. The National Development and Reform Commission should lead the assessment of credit information sharing quality and efficiency among regions and relevant departments.

IV. Deepening the Utilization of Credit Data

(vi) Improve information query services. Financing credit service platforms at all levels should provide services such as information push, information queries, and credit report queries to financial institutions according to the principles of public welfare, in accordance with laws and regulations. They should expand the scope of credit information queries, refine the credit report query system, and enhance the quality of credit reports. Support banking institutions in perfecting credit management systems and increasing the use of credit reports in customer screening, pre-loan investigations, in-loan approvals, and post-loan management, thereby providing high-quality financial services to small and micro enterprises.

(vii) Conduct joint modeling applications. Support financing credit service platforms and financial institutions in establishing joint laboratories for credit information collection and processing. Enhance sensitive data development and application through measures such as ‘keeping data within domain’, and improve the level of financial credit joint modeling. Encourage financial institutions to actively connect with financing credit service platforms and fully utilize credit information to optimize credit product development, credit evaluation, and risk management.

(viii) Develop credit financing products. Fully leverage the credit information aggregation advantages of key enterprises, centralized trading places, and distinctive industrial clusters. Conduct “Credit Easy Loan” special product pilots adaptively. Enhance the application of comprehensive public credit evaluation results, encourage local financing credit service platforms to develop strategic new industries, future industries, green and low-carbon development, key industrial and supply chains, agriculture-related modules, and support financial institutions in utilizing specialized credit information to launch market-oriented financial products and services in niche areas. Accelerate the construction of the rural credit system, support financial institutions in developing exclusive financial products and services for farmers and new types of agricultural operators, and moderately increase the proportion of credit loans.

(ix) Expand and enhance platform service functions. Encourage localities to establish and improve a “policy-to-person” mechanism, fully leverage the advantages of local financing credit service platforms in connecting enterprises and financial institutions, and promote the direct delivery of various financial convenience and enterprise-benefiting policies to small and micro enterprises and other business entities through the platform. Promote financing guarantee institutions to join the financing credit service platforms, establish a multi-party cooperation mechanism involving banks, governments, and financing guarantee institutions based on the platform, and simplify related financing guarantee procedures rationally. Encourage capable localities to establish mechanisms such as “online notarization,” “online arbitration,” and financial internet courts based on financing credit service platforms, for efficient resolution of financial disputes.

(x) Develop the credit service market. Establish operating conditions and standards for the credit information platform. Under the premise of ensuring information security, legally and regulatively open data to various credit service institutions, including credit reporting agencies, steadily foster the credit service market, and enhance the efficiency of matching supply and demand in credit financing.

V. Safeguard Measures

(xi) Strengthen information security and protect the rights and interests of information subjects. Enhance the management of information security on financing credit service platforms, improve management norms and standards for platform integration, institution entry, information collection, information sharing, and data security, and effectively ensure the security of physically collected information. Financing credit service platforms at all levels should strengthen the management of information authorization, enhance the security of data sharing, use, transmission, and storage, improve the monitoring and early warning of security risks, and effectively safeguard data security. Without anonymization or explicit authorization from the information subjects, financing credit service platforms at all levels must not provide information involving trade secrets or personal privacy, nor may they illegally spread, leak, or sell relevant credit information.

(xii) Strengthen policy support and safeguards. Local people’s governments should provide appropriate support for the construction of local financing credit service platforms at their level, guide local platforms and financing guarantee institutions to strengthen cooperation, and enhance the level of financing convenience for small and micro enterprises. Encourage localities to develop incentive policies that support credit financing, and provide appropriate incentives to financial institutions that help small and micro enterprises achieve financing through financing credit service platforms.