China's banking watchdog has set a deadline of one-year for the country's state-owned commercial banks to do something about a growing incidence of financial crimes, state media reported Tuesday. Liu Mingkang, chairman of the China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC), set the timetable in a statement reported by Xinhua news agency although it did not say what would happen if the banks failed to comply.
The commission said Liu made the remarks during a national meeting on combating financial crimes in the state banking sector. Top managers of China's four leading state-owned banks were among those attending the meeting. His comments follow a pledge by the banking regulator last month to crack down on scandal-plagued state-controlled banks after a series of high-profile graft cases again raised transparency and governance issues. The CBRC is racing to clean up the sector ahead of World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules becoming effective that will see China's tightly regulated financial sector open to an influx of foreign competition.