China's capital deficit balloons in FYQ3

BEIJING: China's capital and financial account deficits ballooned in the third quarter of the fiscal year, which officials today attributed to aggressive overseas investments by the world's second-largest economy out of its huge current account surplus.

The capital account deficit expanded to $ 81.6 billion (502 billion yuan) compared with $ 16.2 billion in the April-June period.

There was surplus of $ 94 billion, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) said.

The capital account deficit comes as China invested more aggressively overseas using the huge current account surplus accumulated through foreign trade, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

The third quarter's current account surplus stood at $ 81.5 billion.

For the first nine months, China's total capital and financial account was $ 14.1 billion, in contrast with a current account surplus of $ 162 billion, the report said.

Flush with nearly $ 4 trillion of forex reserves, China is stepping the outbound investments even as it made strong efforts to continue to attract foreign direct investment.

According to official data, China received $ 87.36 billion in FDI so far this year with a slight dip compared to last year but on course for an official target of $ 120 billion.

For the first nine months, China's Outbound Direct Investment (ODI), stood at $ 74.96 billion up 21.6 per cent compared to last year.