On 26 November 2018, Shanghai Guosheng (Group) Co., Ltd. issued an enterprise bond project with a total scale of RMB 1 billion (“the project”), which was approved by National Development and Reform Commission. The fund raised would be invested in the government-funded industrial fund in line with the national industrial policy. Guantao Shanghai office served as the special legal adviser for the issuer of the project, providing legal services throughout the procedure.
This project is the first high-quality enterprise bond of capital operation in China. In accordance with the provisions on bond issuance, the fund raised by an enterprise issuing bonds shall be used for project construction, supplementing working capital or repaying loans. The fund raised by the project would be used in the investment in the government-funded industrial fund in line with the national industrial policy, for instance, advanced manufacturing industry, civil-military integration industry, construction of science and innovation center, aviation industry, marine equipment manufacture industry, new materials and new energy, information industry and intelligent manufacturing, construction of innovation industry in the Yangtze River delta and so on, which for the first time nationally achieved the innovation and breakthrough of investing the fund raised by enterprise bonds in capital operation.
This project is the first shelf-offering enterprise bond in Shanghai. The series of “Shelf-offering enterprise bond” is designed for the “industry-leading” and “local-leading” high-quality main body, adopted the innovative review and approval pattern of “first to approve the overall scale, then to keep on record of the issue of project” and changed the traditional review and approval pattern “approve the scale of bond according to the raise and investment of project”, which is a great innovation in the field of enterprise bond put forward by National Development and Reform Commission.
A legal service team, composed of partner Zou Hongli, associate Niu Junying etc., which was specially set up by Guantao Shanghai office, participated in argumentation of the distribution plan of the project, and mainly undertook examining the major issues, presenting legal opinion, attesting application materials, etc., and provided high-quality and efficient legal service for the project all the way. Due to the great breakthrough of the project in the compliance of use of fund raised and the issue terms as well as that there is no precedent to follow, the legal service team overcame many difficulties, gave full play to its professionalism and creativity and made a great contribution to the success of the project.