Hohhot – capital of North China's Inner Mongolia autonomous region – has been taking financial steps to help small and medium-sized enterprises in the city that have been hit by the COVID-19 epidemic, according to local media reports.

Zhubaodai is a financial product jointly launched by the Hohhot bureau of industry and information technology and local banks to serve the businesses.

These can get bank loans and obtain preferential interest rates through risk capital pools provided by the municipal bureau of industry and information technology, a number of credit lines offered by banks and a certain amount of funding provided by other enterprises. 

The average interest rate is no higher than 4 percent, saving considerable funding costs for the companies.

Through the tripartite risk-sharing model of the government, banks and enterprises, it is understood to not only solve the problem of insufficient mortgages, but also ameliorate the problem of small loan amounts for small and medium-sized enterprises.

During the first quarter of the year, banks during the outbreak simplified the service process, opened fast-track channels and adopted a combination of on-site and online services, providing a total of 141 million yuan ($22.15 million) of credit lines to 22 enterprises.

The number of credit companies increased by 83 percent year-on-year during the period, while the financing amount increased by 188 percent year-on-year and finance costs were reduced by some 2 million yuan.

Since the launch of Zhubaodai in 2017, the governments of the Inner Mongolia autonomous region and Hohhot have to date injected a total of 195 million yuan into the risk compensation fund pool, while the city's financing business has lent 3.14 billion yuan to 579 companies.