Meanwhile, China's major state-owned enterprises are accelerating their efforts to complete their structural reforms by New Year's Eve. The reforms target SOEs supervised by the central government except for financial and cultural entities. Those SOEs will be turned into limited liability or joint-stock companies. Let's take a closer look.

China has launched a series of reforms to realize the significance of SOEs to the country's sustainable growth. Corporate structure reform is one of the key tasks of SOE reform.

The reforms include a contemporary corporate system aiming to separate government administration from business operations by restructuring the SOEs into limited companies. That requires the SOEs previously registered in accordance with the Enterprise Law to re-register under the Company Law.

The reforms proceed with disciplined operations when handling SOE ownership structure and corporate debt. For central SOEs that become wholly state-funded enterprises, registered assets will be calculated according to the net asset value of the previous year. Those that become enterprises with diverse equity structures will go through specific procedures, including asset verification and financial audits.

So far, a group of central SOEs, including PetroChina, China Mobile, China National Nuclear and the China FAW Group, have already wrapped up their corporate structural reforms.  Shares of 47 SOEs listed on China's two major exchanges remain suspended as the companies prepared for major assets restructuring and other key events.

To date, the restructuring plans at group levels in central enterprises have all been approved. That's according to the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council. Eighty-seven of the enterprises have created boards of directors.  The boards will have a say in major corporate decisions, including hiring and salary distribution.

Meanwhile, China is also pushing ahead with mixed ownership by allowing private capital to invest in firms while retaining a government presence in the companies. Fifty pilot enterprises have been chosen for the effort from all of the major sectors.

Previous efforts to revitalize the SOEs have paid off. The latest data from the Ministry of Finance showed that combined SOE profits rose 24.6 percent year on year to 2.39 trillion yuan in the first 10 months of this year.

Analysts say China will likely speed up SOE reforms in the coming year.