Looking at China's financial sector now. The Chinese government is continuing its crackdown on unregulated local government debt. That's as fresh Finance Ministry data shows that local governments across China issued bonds worth 4.4 trillion yuan in 2017. The central government has launched a variety of policies in recent months designed to control local debt. Chen Tong has more.

Issuing debt instruments is a way for local governments to increase their budgets, but the concern is that a good deal of that debt could turn out to be unserviceable. During the National Financial Work Conference last year, officials said the expansion of local government debt has become a major risk to China's economic development. The lack of transparency of many these debts -- and the lack of regulation of public-private partnerships -- could all create problems.

SHAO YU, CHIEF ECONOMIST ORIENT SECURITIES "Of all sectors in China's real economy, local government debt is the sector that most lacks transparency, but the volume is quite large. If the leverage could be well-controlled, the risks would be reduced. I think local governments are making things more transparent, making invisible debts accountable and clarifying who is responsible for them. That will be good for the management structure in local government, and will also help to adjust the relationship between local governments and the central government."

Everyone is working on it. In December last year, the National Audit Office released a work report on government efforts to curb unregulated issuance of local government debt. The report says local officials responsible for unregulated debt have been dismissed in Chongqing, Shandong and Henan. As of the end of 2016, the total of local government debt reached 27 trillion yuan, over 30 percent of the country's GDP. The government's next step will be to strengthen auditing and management of this debt.

QIAN SHIZHENG, PROFESSOR SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT, FUDAN UNIVERSITY "Since January, we've seen the Ministry of Finance begin to limit the issuance of local government debt, for example -- public-private partnerships that invest in infrastructure projects. We believe that over the past three years, local government debt has been increasingly well-controlled by the central government. Risks are gradually being curbed."

In 2017, China issued a total of over 1,100 local government bonds. Their value was a 30 percent decline from 2016, and the value for this year is expected to remain at about the same level.