Ministry of Finance · Full chronicle and history

On October 23, the Ministry of Finance released fiscal revenue and expenditure data for the first three quarters. In September, national land transfer revenue was 233.4 billion yuan, down 23.2% year on year; individual income tax revenue was 138.4 billion yuan, up 10.5% year on year. In the first three quarters, land transfer revenue decreased by 621.5 billion yuan year on year.

The Ministry of Finance's 2026 budget shows that central government debt interest expenditure is 873.99 billion yuan, accounting for about 19.2% of central-level expenditure.

On October 9, the Ministry of Finance announced the arrangement and use of 550 billion yuan in local government debt carryover quotas, of which 300 billion yuan will be fully allocated to counties and districts to enhance general public budget support capacity, and 250 billion yuan will be used to support investment projects.

The Ministry of Finance auctioned five-year special treasury bonds for capital injection, with a coupon rate of only 1.37 percent.

The Ministry of Finance, the central bank, and the National Financial Regulatory Administration jointly announced that starting October 1, eligible first-home mortgages will receive a fiscal interest subsidy of 1 percentage point per annum.

On September 29, the Ministry of Finance, the central bank, and the National Financial Regulatory Administration jointly announced that starting October 1, eligible first-home mortgages will receive fiscal interest subsidies, with an implementation period provisionally set at one year — the first time the central fiscal budget has subsidized individual housing mortgages. The subsidy applies to newly purchased first-home loans for properties with an area of no more than 120 square meters and a total price of no more than 1.5 million yuan, providing an annualized interest subsidy of 1 percentage point on loans of up to 1 million yuan, for a maximum of five years.

Data from the Ministry of Finance shows that national revenue from the transfer of state-owned land use rights has dropped to over 970 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 31.5%.

Data released by the Ministry of Finance shows that national general public budget revenue rose 5.7% year-on-year from January to August, while income from the transfer of state-owned land use rights plunged 28.6%.

On September 11, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the National Supervisory Commission together with the Ministry of Finance jointly reported six cases of local government hidden debt, naming Anhui’s Jieshou, Jiangxi’s Jiujiang and Ningxia’s Yinchuan for falsifying, misappropriating or using new loans to repay old ones, with “debt‑conversion fraud” amounts totaling 2.94 billion yuan, and also mentioned the issue that during Wu Shenghua’s tenure as former party secretary of Bijie, Guizhou, debt increased rather than decreased.

The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the National Supervisory Commission, along with the Ministry of Finance, reported on September 11 that Jieshou, Anhui, only repaid 42 million yuan in debt but reported 182 million yuan, falsifying its debt reduction achievements.

The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the National Supervisory Commission, together with the Ministry of Finance, announced on September 11 that Jiujiang in Jiangxi repaid old debts by taking on new ones and counted 1 billion yuan as a debt resolution result.

The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the National Supervisory Commission, together with the Ministry of Finance, announced on September 11 that of the 2.958 billion yuan in debt-resolution funds in Yinchuan, Ningxia, only 1.158 billion yuan was actually used to repay debt, while the remaining 1.8 billion yuan was used for corporate operations, yet all of it was recorded in the debt-resolution system.

A September 11 notice from the National Commission of Supervision and the Ministry of Finance mentioned that during the tenure of Wu Shenghua, former Party Secretary of Bijie, Guizhou, the outstanding debt balance rose instead of falling, with the 2024 debt resolution task completion rate at only 20%, ranking last in the entire province. He once said, "The debts were all incurred by my predecessors — why should I be the one to pay them back?"

An announcement by the Ministry of Finance and the State Taxation Administration stipulates that dividend and bonus income received by foreign individuals from foreign-invested enterprises will no longer be exempt from individual income tax and will be taxed at a rate of 20%, effective from September 1.

On September 1, 2026, the Ministry of Finance and the State Taxation Administration jointly announced that dividend income received by foreign individuals from foreign-invested enterprises will no longer be exempt from individual income tax and will be uniformly taxed at a rate of 20%.

Amid soaring bad loans and inadequate capital at major state-owned banks, China's Ministry of Finance issued 300 billion yuan in special treasury bonds in September 2026 to replenish the capital of major state-owned banks such as the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, Agricultural Bank of China, Bank of China, and China Construction Bank.

Through issuing special treasury bonds that were subscribed by banks and then converted into targeted share issuances, the Ministry of Finance injected 500 billion yuan in 2025 and 300 billion yuan in 2026, a total of 800 billion yuan, to replenish the core tier-1 capital of the big banks, making Central Huijin the largest shareholder of the four major banks.

Local hidden debt fell from 14.3 trillion yuan at the end of 2023 to 6.5 trillion yuan at the end of 2025, a decrease of 7.8 trillion yuan; over the same period, local statutory debt rose from 40.7 trillion yuan to 54.8 trillion yuan, an increase of 14.1 trillion yuan, with the swap mainly addressing the interest problem.

A total of 6 trillion yuan in local government replacement bonds from 2024 to 2026; as of the end of August 2026, 5.84 trillion yuan had been issued, accounting for 97.3%. The year 2026 is the final year.

On August 28, 2026, China's Ministry of Finance released a draft of the Local Surcharge Tax Law for public comment, proposing to merge the urban construction tax, the education surcharge, and the local education surcharge into a single local surcharge tax, with a unified tax rate set at 11% to 13%.

The Ministry of Finance said that more than 2 trillion yuan of bonds will continue to be issued in the second half of the year, a relatively large scale for the same period of previous years; the 2026 quota for new special bonds is 4.4 trillion yuan, and ultra-long-term special treasury bonds total 1.3 trillion yuan.

On August 21, 2026, the Ministry of Finance released the national fiscal revenue and expenditure situation for January to July. Local governments' income from the transfer of state-owned land use rights was 1.1731 trillion yuan, down 30.8% year-on-year.

Data released by the Ministry of Finance of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) shows that land grant revenue across China fell by 31% from January to July 2026.

On July 24, 2026, China's Ministry of Finance and the State Taxation Administration issued an announcement requiring individual residents to pay a 20% personal income tax on assets transferred into offshore trusts and the income generated during their existence, with a 90-day transition period.

On July 24, 2026, the Ministry of Finance and the State Taxation Administration issued new rules stipulating that when Chinese tax residents transfer assets such as stocks and equity into offshore trusts, the relevant gains may be taxed at 20%. According to Reuters, the new rules have prompted some wealthy Chinese to raise cash and consider selling assets or borrowing to pay the tax.

The Ministry of Finance and the State Taxation Administration issued an announcement on July 24 stating that individuals who have obtained foreign nationality or permanent residency abroad but whose principal economic interests come from within China may be recognized as Chinese tax residents, and that upon converting to non-resident status they must carry out tax clearance on gains from offshore trusts.

The Ministry of Finance and the State Taxation Administration released Announcement No. 21; videos claim the announcement involves tax measures on offshore trusts.

Data released by the Ministry of Finance show that national land transfer revenue in the first 5 months of 2026 was 804.8 billion yuan, a year-on-year decline of 28.7%.

By April 2026, the overnight reverse repo acting as a buffer water tower will have less than 200 million remaining, nearly wiping it out. The Ministry of Finance's withdrawal of funds will directly drain bank reserves.

In the first half of 2026, China saw an unprecedented year in which not a single province, municipality, or autonomous region had fiscal revenue capable of covering fiscal expenditure, with local finances in extreme distress.

The Ministry of Finance and the State Taxation Administration jointly issued Document No. 28 of 2026, the "Measures for the Administration of Withholding and Remitting Value-Added Tax on Behalf of Natural Persons by Domestic Entities", which is set to be mandatorily enforced nationwide from November 1, 2026. When any entity settles fees with an individual that give rise to value-added tax, it must withhold the VAT and related taxes and fees; otherwise it bears joint responsibility for tax evasion.

In 2025 China's Ministry of Finance issued 520 billion yuan in special treasury bonds to replenish the capital of large state-owned banks; a year later the finance authorities issued bonds again to inject capital.

In 2016, a Ministry of Finance investigation found that 72 of 93 automakers were suspected of defrauding subsidies, with the case rate reaching as high as 80%.

The Ministry of Finance issued 270 billion yuan in special treasury bonds to replenish the capital of the Big Four banks, and set up four major asset management companies to strip off 1.4 trillion yuan in non-performing assets.