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   By Xie Fang

The list of Top 500 Chinese Enterprises for 2018 was released by the China Enterprise Federation/China Enterprise Directors Association (CEC/CEDA) on Sunday, as reported by the Xinhua Net Sunday afternoon.

By generating nearly 2.36 trillion yuan (344.84 billion U.S. dollars) in operating revenue, the State Grid Corporation of China (SGCC) ranks first on this year's list, while the country's two oil giants, the Sinopec Group and the PetroChina Co. take up the second and third spots, with their operating revenues reaching around 2.21 trillion yuan (323.34 billion U.S. dollars) and 2.20 trillion yuan (322.43 billion U.S. dollars) respectively.

The total operating revenue generated by the 500 Chinese companies on the list grew by 11.2 percent from a year earlier to hit 71.17 trillion yuan (roughly 10.41 trillion U.S. dollars), which accounts for up to 86 percent of China's total GDP for 2017.

To put its name on this year's list, a company has to earn at least 30.69 billion yuan (4.49 billion U.S. dollars) in operating revenue, which also marks the first time in history that the minimum operating revenue for inclusion in the list exceeds 30 billion yuan (around 4.4 billion U.S dollars).

It turns out that the financial industry is the most profitable industry in China, with the 33 financial enterprises on the list contributing more than half of the total profit made by this year's top 500 Chinese enterprises.

What's more, 237 out of the 500 enterprises appearing on this year's list are private enterprises, making up for 47 percent of the list, which further narrows the gap between private enterprises and their state-owned peers.

China's four largest Internet companies, namely, Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent and JD.com, are all showing up on the list, with JD.com ranking 42nd, the highest rank among them.

The list also shows that China's top 500 enterprises have spent more on research and development (R&D) this year as the total R&D investment rose by 21.63 percent from the previous year to over 895 billion yuan (131.29 billion U.S. dollar). And companies from China's southern province of Guangdong are ahead of companies from other regions in terms of R&D investment.