China Development Finance Corporation

Monnet arrived in Shanghai on 21 November 1933 from San Francisco and, in early 1934, came to the conclusion that, unlike in his initial blueprint, the CDFC should be formed with equity capital from China only.

[6]: 27 The Japanese government's initial reaction was hostile, despite Monnet's efforts to keep them continuously informed of the project's development,[7] though that did not prevent the CDFC from starting its activity in 1934.

[4] The CDFC soon built up multiple businesses and became a conglomerate with activities in coal mining, electricity generation, but also department stores (through shareholding in Wing On), cotton, lumber, and stamp tax collection for the Chinese government.

After 1945 it was able to repossess its former assets in the areas liberated from Japanese occupation, but many of these had been damaged and investment was made more difficult by the context of hyperinflation and civil war.

Eventually, the People's Republic of China seized all mainland CDFC properties in 1949 as "bureaucratic capitalist enterprises".

[4] In his memoirs written in the 1970s, Monnet reflected about the CDFC experience that "[t]he Soong family and their associates were among the main shareholders in the China [Development Finance] Corporation.