China’s lending boom to developing countries is morphing into defaults and debt distress. Given the secrecy surrounding China’s loans, also the associated defaults remain “hidden”, as missed payments and restructuring details are not disclosed. We construct an encompassing dataset of...

This paper shows that China has launched a new global system for cross-border rescue lending to countries in debt distress. We build the first comprehensive dataset on China’s overseas bailouts between 2000 and 2021 and provide new insights into China’s growing role in the global financial...

This study examines the impact of political risk on Chinese outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) and what motivates their preferred location. The study also analyzes the OFDI of other countries to enhance the comparison of China and other countries’ OFDI sensitivity to political risk. The...

Compared with China's dominance in world trade, its expanding role in global finance is poorly documented and understood. Over the past decades, China has exported record amounts of capital to the rest of the world. Many of these financial flows are not reported to the IMF, the BIS or the World...

Compared with China's pre-eminent status in world trade, its role in global finance is poorly understood. This paper studies the size, characteristics, and determinants of China's capital exports building a new database of 5000 loans and grants to 152 countries, 1949-2017. We find that 50% of...

We analyze shifts in the structure of China's capital outflows over the past decade. The composition of gross outflows has shifted from accumulation of foreign exchange reserves by the central bank to nonofficial outflows. Unlocking the enormous pool of domestic savings could have a significant...

We document the rise of China in offshore capital markets. Chinese firms use global tax havens to access foreign capital both in equity and bond markets. In the last twenty years, China's presence went from raising a negligible amount of capital in these markets to accounting for more than half...

The dynamic process of integration of national economies has a long history, with two distinct waves: one, from the middle of the 19th century until its interruption with outbreak of the First World War in 1913 till the end of the Second World War in 1945. The second wave is ongoing dating from...

Global firms finance themselves through foreign subsidiaries, often shell companies in tax havens, which obscures their nationality in aggregate statistics. We associate the universe of traded securities with their issuer's ultimate parent and restate bilateral investment positions to better...