BEIJING -- China's trust industry continued to shrink in the first quarter of this year amid heightened efforts in its structural optimization and quality development push.

The country's total trust assets reached 20.38 trillion yuan (about $3.2 trillion) at the end of the first quarter, down 4.46 percent year-on-year, data from the China Trustee Association (CTA) showed.

This came after the industry had complied with relevant supervision and actively restricted its expansion while making structural adjustments, said Chen Jin, a CTA researcher, adding that the industry is shifting its focus from scale to quality.

CTA data showed that nearly 4.9 trillion yuan, or over 30 percent of outstanding trust fund investment, went to industrial and commercial enterprises at the end of the first quarter.

Industrial and commercial enterprises have been the largest investment recipients since 2016, while investment into real estate has contracted. This helps trust firms better support the real economy, Chen said.