Conclusion

This book submits that the network between active participants of Chinese trust business (including both the service providers and consumers) constitutes a dense network. The high embeddedness of dense network surrounding Chinese trust industry generates social trust between actors in the relevant society that allows the trust business to flourish. However, with the development of metropolitan areas in China, this book predicts that the network between the citizens and the wealth management service providers in China changes from dense network to sparse one. In this circumstance, Chinese trust business would be likely to adapt itself to a dense network through developing institutionalized trust. In a sparse network, actors in the network are more likely to reserve their ownership rights rather than put themselves into risk of losing the ownership of trust property, unless institutionalized trust is built between service providers and potential consumers. This book concludes that the clarification of the location of trust property ownership in Chinese Trust Law would become essential and also practicable. A further proposal of this book is that Chinese trust companies would be obliged to build social trust from potential consumers over time. Only if consumers’ trust in trust companies reaches a certain degree, is the time ripe for the clarification of Chinese Trust Law.