State Grid joins queue to sell assets amid SOE reform push

The world's largest utilities company, State Grid Corp of China, has become the latest state-owned enterprise to seek to sell off largely unprofitable assets, following mainland policymakers' call for diversification of ownership amid reform of the state-owned sector.

The proposed asset disposals by State Grid come shortly after Sinopec, one of the mainland's three oil majors, said it was seeking private investors to buy 30 per cent of its retail assets, which could fetch US$30 billion.

State Grid had marked three units for disposal: high-voltage direct-current transmission networks, electric-car charger facilities and pumped-storage hydroelectricity, the Economic Information Daily reported yesterday. It said they were loss-making or barely breaking even.

The mainland newspaper citied an unidentified source at State Grid as saying the company had been suffering losses from its investment in electric-car charger facilities and it had become a "headache" and a "burden" for the firm.

State Grid chairman Liu Zhenya previously said anyone with enough money could invest in such non-core facilities.

Due to the sluggish market for electric cars on the mainland, the power distributor had only completed 400 electric-car charging stations by the end of last year, a long way from the central government's goal of building 4,000 by next year.