China's top legislature is to discuss an issuance of special treasury bonds by the Ministry of Finance (MOF) for the country's foreign exchange investment at a six-day session beginning on June 24.

The Chinese government said in March it would establish a state foreign exchange investment company this year to maximize returns on the country's huge foreign exchange reserves.

By the end of March this year, China's foreign exchange reserves had reached US$1.2 trillion, up 37.4 percent on the previous year, mostly invested in low-yielding dollar bonds.

Tuesday's Shanghai Securities News quoted an unnamed insider as saying the company would receive capital from the MOF, which planned to issue US$200 billion to US$250 billion of special treasury bonds to purchase the same amount of foreign exchange from the central bank.

In May, the company, which was not yet fully established, agreed to invest three billion US dollars in the US private equity firm the Blackstone Group.

Other economic issues on the agenda of the 28th session of the Standing Committee of the 10th National People's Congress (NPC) include a draft anti-monopoly law and a draft amendment to the law on energy conservation.

(Xinhua News Agency June 19, 2007)