China's new railway firm reports losses

China Railway Corp, the new national railway operator that has taken over the business operations of the defunct Ministry of Railways, posted losses in the first quarter with its debt-to-asset ratio up slightly to 62.31 percent.

At the end of March, the company's total liabilities stood at 2.84 trillion yuan (US$461 billion) from 2.79 trillion yuan at the end of 2012, according to an audit report posted on ChinaMoney, an official website for China's money market.

The company's total assets stood at 4.56 trillion yuan at the end of the first quarter.

The debt-to-asset ratio was slightly up from 62.23 percent at the end of last year and higher than 60.63 percent at the end of 2011.

During the first three months of this year, the state-owned giant posted negative profits after tax of 6.88 billion yuan while taking out local and foreign loans valued at 100.9 billion yuan, according to the report, which did not cite a reason for the corporation's net losses.