News Analysis Beijing has recently ordered local governments to accelerate the listing and issuance of real estate investment trusts (REITs) in the infrastructure sector, pledging to grant policy support. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is currently seeking to strengthen infrastructure funding channels and alleviate local debt risk, while easing pressure on the central government’s finance. In June 2021, when China’s first nine infrastructure REITs went public, former Chinese Finance Minister Lou Jiwei said the time had come to remove the debt risk of local government financing vehicles (LGFVs). The LGFV is the primary source of hidden debts for local governments. By the end of 2020, the total debt of LGFVs soared to more than $8 trillion from $2.4 trillion in 2013, according to a report released by Goldman Sachs in September 2021. That exceeded half the size of China’s gross domestic product (GDP) in 2020, larger than the amount of …