The venture capital (VC) funds kept rising in China last year, with 91 new funds entering into market, up 57 percent from the previous year, according to a report released by EZ Capital and Holy Zone, a consulting firm.

Up to 264 billion Yuan (37.7 billion U.S. dollars) were raised by the new funds in 2008, a rise of 347 percent, China Daily quoted the report as saying Monday.

The report said most of the new funds were Yuan-denominated, while only 33 were dollar-denominated funds.

It was a result of the government efforts to promote venture capital in China, as the government had unveiled new rules to give local funds a healthy development condition and make progress on setting up a trading board for emerging companies, the newspaper said.

However, most of the Yuan-denominated funds were small, with an average value of 672 million Yuan, or one-ninth of that of the dollar-denominated funds, according to the report.

Foreign VC funds have long been taking the dominant role in terms of the investment value in China. The favored sectors include the information technology, new media, telecommunication and semiconductor.

Source:Xinhua