Individual Loans Application to Buy a House Becomes Difficult
Effective tomorrow, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China and the China Construction Bank will cancel preferential policies allowing lenders to buy a house with a first down payment at 20%, and enjoy 30% discounts on their interest rates. The move was initiated by the Bank of China and only one state-owned bank, the Agriculture Bank of China still maintains this policy. Applying for individual loans from a commercial bank to buy a house has become difficult in recent months.

Ship builder CSSC net profit down 40% in 2009
The China State Shipbuilding Co., the country's leading ship builder, announced this Monday (Mar 29th) that net profits in 2009 shrank by nearly 40 percent due to declining orders and prices hit by the global economic slowdown. The Shanghai-based firm said in its 2009 annual report that its net profits fell to 2.5 billion yuan. The report also said, that its annual business revenue dropped almost 9 percent to around 25 billion yuan last year from 2008.

Hisense posts net profit surge in 2009
Hisense Electric Co., a major home appliances manufacturer in China, announced on Monday that it more than doubled its net profits in 2009. In its annual business report filed to the Shanghai Stock Exchange, the Qingdao-based company said that its net profits rose 121 percent year-on-year to nearly 500 million yuan. The company attributed the surge to its expansion in the domestic market, driven by the country's policies of subsidizing the sale of home appliances in the countryside and getting consumers to trade-in old home appliances for new ones.