The State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) has recently disseminated China's external debt data as at the end of December 2018. The SAFE spokesperson and Chief Economist Wang Chunying answered media questions on China’s recent external debt situations.

Q: Could you brief us on China's external debt for the year of 2018?

A: China’s external debt continued to increase in 2018, while the overall growth rate slowed down. As at the end of December, the full-scale outstanding external debt (including domestic and foreign currencies) hit USD 1.9652 trillion, representing an increase of USD 207.3 billion from the end of 2017, up by 12%. In the four quarters of 2018, the quarter-on-quarter change of China’s external debt was 7.5%, 1.5%, 2.7% and -0.2% respectively. Specifically, the first quarter registered the fastest growth, while the second and third quarters witnessed obvious slowdown of growth rate.

The structure of external debt has continued to improve. With respect to currency structure, the external debt in domestic currency increased by 16% year on year, which is higher than the 10% increase in foreign currency external debt. In terms of term structure, the medium- and long-term external debt increased by 13% year on year, slightly faster than that of short-term debts, which posted an 11% growth rate. As regards debt instruments, it is mainly attributed to increase of debt securities, currency and deposits, as well as trade credit and advance payment, which contributed to 44%, 23% and 20% respectively to the increase of external debt.

Q: How shall we view the external debt risks facing China now?

A: China’s national economic operation in 2018 was generally stable. The SAFE has deepened foreign exchange administration reform on an ongoing basis, steadily promoted the opening-up of the financial market, therefore the demand of overseas investors for allocating domestic RMB bonds has continued to rise, and the structure of debt instruments has become more stable. At the end of 2018, the outstanding debt securities accounted for 22% of the full-scale outstanding external debt, up by 2.6 percentage points from the end of 2017.

The external debt risks facing China are controllable on the whole. As at the end of 2018, the external debt/GDP ratio, or the ratio of outstanding external debt to GDP was 14.4%; the debt ratio, or the ratio of outstanding external debt to export income from trade in goods and services was 74.1%; the debt servicing ratio, or the ratio of payments of principal and interest on external debt in the middle and long term and payments of interest on external debt in the short term to export income from trade in goods and services, was 5.5%, and the ratio of short-term external debt to foreign exchange reserves was 41.4%. All of the above indicators are within the internationally accepted safe range.

In the future, the SAFE will further refine the two-pronged administration framework featuring macro-prudential and micro-regulatory approaches for cross-border capital flow, keep a keen eye on the changes in external debt situations, and strengthen the prevention of external debt risks while persisting in serving the real economy with foreign exchange administration, so as to safeguard China's economic and financial security.