The Future of China Commercial Registration System: From the Perspective of the Legal Reform in Free Trade Zone and Free Trade Port

This study focuses on analyzing the reform of commercial registration system in Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone (FTZ) and Hainan Free Trade Port (FTP) of China, by adopting the evaluation indicator of Starting a business of the World Bank's Doing Business. By implementing the new policies of Negative List and relative supporting policies like the separation of two licenses and e-registration, the reforms as to the mode and guiding philosophy of regulations on commercial registration in the FTZ/FTP achieved a positive spillover effect. However, there remain several problems, such as the fragmentation of the normative documents related, the overlarge scope of substantive examination of commercial registration, the Chinese government needs to further perfect the commercial registration system by means of delimiting the scope of application of market access upon commitment, further optimizing the Doing Business, enhancing the regulations of financial information of enterprises, harmonizing the legal system of regulatory authorities and strengthening the legislation on applicant's accountability and disciplinary mechanisms.