More real estate investment trusts (REITs) are expected to be listed in China in the near term to revitalize existing assets, expand financing channels, and further boost economic growth, according to experts at a seminar held in Beijing on Tuesday.

REITs are publicly-listed trusts backed by real assets and produce stable yields for investors based on cash flows from a collection of properties or infrastructure assets.

The recent Central Economic Work Conference highlighted Public REITs as a crucial tool to help achieve the smooth transition of real estate to a new development model and ensure stable development, said Xiao Gang, former chairman of the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC), at a seminar held by Tsinghua University's PBCSF research center for real estate finance. He said REITs can effectively utilize existing assets and foster sound circulation between existing assets and new investments.

China's public REITs were first established in the infrastructure sector. In December, the country expanded the pilot scheme for REITs to cover more fields, such as the market-oriented long-term rental and commercial real estate sectors, new energy, water conservancy, new infrastructure, and other infrastructure fields, said Li Chao, deputy director of the CSRC.

Currently, approximately 85 percent of China's public REITs are related to highways, industrial parks, and warehousing and logistics, said Liu Weimin, general manager of CITIC Securities at the seminar.

Steadily expanding the scope of REITs will maintain the healthy development of the market, direct investment capital to sectors that need it, and provide more options for investors, without driving up housing prices or other in-demand real estate sectors, Liu added.

The CSRC also plans to increase placements of existing infrastructure REITs to support market entities in acquiring assets, optimizing investment portfolios, and facilitating mergers and acquisitions with financing, according to the CSRC.

In the long term, REITs will bring about a change in mindset in the Chinese real estate market, said Gao Xiqing, former vice chairman of the CSRC and professor at Duke University, at the seminar. 

REITs will enable China's real estate sector to adopt a long-term asset management view, explained Gao. This aligns with China's housing policies, which stress the importance of diversified and enriched supplies as well as the equal importance of rental and home purchases.

Since China's first batch of nine REITs went public in June last year, the country's REITs market has grown rapidly. By the end of November, a total of 24 REITs had been approved and 22 were floated on the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges, official data showed.

Although China's REITs market is relatively new, experts believe that REITs in the world's second-largest economy have immense potential for investors and expect several new REITs to be launched in the future.

As the REITs market gradually matures, it will provide solutions to the problems faced by China's real estate industry, and provide new opportunities for China's capital market and even the international financial market, said Gao.