Chinese police reported 62,000 economic crimes in the first ten months this year, an increase of 9.1 percent over the the same period last year, the Ministry of Public Security (MPS) said on Thursday.

Economic crimes, especially those involving a large number of people, such as pyramid selling or fund-raising fraud, "could trigger social instability and impede economic security of the country," Gao Feng, a ministry official, said at a press conference.

Chinese police in the meantime cracked 49,000 of the reported economic crimes, a rise of 4.3 percent year on year, and recovered12.94 billion yuan of losses from swindlers, or 51.8 percent more than the same time last year, said Gao, deputy-director of the Economic Investigation Bureau under the ministry.

Of the settled crimes, 507 were illegal pooling of public funds with 399 million yuan finally recovered; and 501 were fund-raising frauds, with 169 million yuan recovered, Gao said.

Editor: Donald