Wednesday 18 January 2012

China foreign inflows drop in December

Foreign direct investment in China rose 9.7 per cent last year to a record US$116 billion, though December’s inflow of US$12.24 billion was down 12.7 per cent versus year-ago levels, the Commerce Ministry said on Wednesday.

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Guanyu said...

China foreign inflows drop in December

Reuters in Beijing
18 January 2012

Foreign direct investment in China rose 9.7 per cent last year to a record US$116 billion, though December’s inflow of US$12.24 billion was down 12.7 per cent versus year-ago levels, the Commerce Ministry said on Wednesday.

It was the second consecutive month that China’s non-financial foreign direct investment (FDI) fell versus year-ago levels, signalling that once unabated capital flow into the world’s second-biggest economy is stuttering.

FDI inflows from the United States sank 26.1 per cent last year to US$3.0 billion, while those from the European Union fell a more modest 3.65 per cent to US$6.3 billion, the Commerce Ministry said.

China’s non-financial outbound direct investments, meanwhile, rose 1.8 per cent last year to US$60.1 billion, taking the outstanding value of China’s outbound investments to US$322 billion by the end of the year.

In last year alone, China invested in 1,392 overseas projects in 132 countries.

“China’s investments in Europe and Africa were particularly strong last year,” Shen Danyang, the spokesman of Ministry of Commerce, told a regular news conference.

That outward investment strength comes as inward investments cooled sharply in the closing months of last year - a distinct difference to the situation in 2010.

FDI inflow in December 2010 grew 15.6 per cent at an annual rate to US$14 billion, a record for any single month, and helped push overall flows for 2010 up 17 per cent to US$105.7 billion.

The deceleration from that high level might well have been expected in December last year, but it came after China reported a 9.8 per cent year-on-year decline in November. That was the first fall in 28 months.

Shen said general global economic weakness had restrained both inward and outward investments last year, but added that China should report “relatively fast” growth in both areas this year.

The Commerce Ministry said earlier this month it aimed to attract an average of US$120 billion FDI in each of the next four years.

It also unveiled new rules to encourage foreign investment in strategic emerging industries, particularly those that bring new technology and know-how to China.

Investment inflows, which surged in the years after China joined the World Trade Organisation in 2001, have recovered strongly after being hit hard by the global economic slowdown in 2008/09.