China Investment Corp. Debuted

China Investment Corp. (CIC), responsible for managing part of China's foreign exchange reserves, began operations this year with senior government official Lou Jiwei as its chief.

The sovereign wealth fund, a Chinese version of the Singaporean Temasek Holdings, was officially set up on September 29. Its aim is to divert the risks of China's ballooning foreign reserve, which stood at $1.43 trillion by the end of September this year-the largest in the world.

In May, the CIC, still in preparation, made its first investment in non-voting shares, valued at $3 billion, in the Blackstone Group, a U.S. private equity firm.

The company has had a total of $200 billion in registered capital allocated from China's foreign exchange reserves. The Ministry of Finance issued 1.55 trillion yuan ($208 billion) worth of special treasury bonds to buy the foreign exchange reserves and inject the funds into the CIC.

One third of CIC's capital will be used to purchase Central Huijin, which now controls China's major state-owned commercial banks; another third to replenish the capital of the Agricultural Bank of China and China Development Bank; and the remaining third to invest in global financial markets.