While acknowledging China's concerns about the possible impact of the ongoing trade spat with Washington, Moscow-based economic expert Alexander Salitsky believes that some of the money they are taking out of the US could be explained by the improving economic situation in China.
“We’ve been seeing stable economic growth in China with the yuan now looking more reliable than the dollar. This could be a reason for the current asset repatriation process,” Salitsky said.
“I still believe that these fluctuations will hardly be able to change the overall trend of Chinese companies consolidating their presence in the US market and investing in a growing number of US economic sectors,” he added.
“The US government is implementing a number of protectionist measures in trade and this will make the US market less attractive to foreign investors who will start looking elsewhere. If the US turns its number one global market into a send-rate one, Chinese companies will still be able to explore international and regional markets, above all as part of the Road and Belt project including in Europe, Africa, Southeast Asia, Central Asia as well as West and South Asia,” he said.
He added that the Eurasian continent and countries of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization are also very attractive.
And, finally, there is the potential of the BRICS countries which contribution to the global economic growth exceeds 50 percent. Brazil, South Africa and other BRICS countries are rich in natural resources and have a great deal of economic interconnection.
“A Giant Prison”
“At the same time, the US is like a giant prison with all kinds of barriers and self-isolationism. It is also very much isolated in the G7, but Chinese companies don’t care much about that as they are growing fast and enjoy a great deal of support inside the country. America’s protectionism could cost it the loss of Chinese investments and the giant Chinese market,” Liu warned.
China’s Energy Investment Corporation, one of the biggest in the world by asset value, has put on hold talks with its US partners on the implementation of a series of joint shale gas, energy and petrochemical projects
The $83.7 billion deal was signed during President Donald Trump’s visit to China in November 2017.
Brian Anderson, director of the West Virginia University Energy Institute, told Reuters on Wednesday that a visit by a Chinese delegation, led by the China Energy Corporation’s CEO for talks with US officials had been canceled “because it would be inappropriate in the midst of this trade dispute for China to come.”
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According to a Rhodium Group report released on Wednesday, Chinese investments in the US dropped by a whopping 92 percent amid the ongoing trade war between the two countries.
A survey recently conducted by China General Chamber of Commerce – a USA nonprofit organization representing about 1,500 Chinese firms working in the US, showed that 22 percent of them were now ready to repatriate most of their revenues to China – a sharp jump from last year's figure of just nine percent.
The views expressed in this article are solely those of the speaker and do not necessarily reflect the official position of Sputnik.