"It's certain that real estate bubbles do exist in large cities in China, and the trend is still developing."

Li Wei, director of the Development Research Center, a government think tank, says the condition of supply exceeding demand has emerged in the real estate market in the third-and fourth-tier cities, and prices reflect a decrease of 30 to 40 percent in those cities.

"The private fund business will be an important means of financial cooperation between the two cities."

Chan Ka-Keung, secretary for Hong Kong Financial Services and the Treasury Bureau, says that Beijing and Hong Kong should cooperate to promote the involvement of private capital in the financial industry.

"The benefit of the FTZ is more than what we have seen so far. The FTZ is a very important attempt at reform and further opening up."

Wang jianhui, chief economist of Southwest securities Co Ltd, saying that the concept of Shanghai free trade zone has not been fully demonstrated in that there are just a few stocks in the sectors of trade, logistics or property being played up. He anticipates some innovative high-technology companies and fully internationalized logistics companies will enter the zone.

(China Daily Africa Weekly 11/01/2013 page18)