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Statistics of capital account in 2009 not comparable to 2008: SAFE

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-02-06 09:40

Preliminary statistics which showed a surge in China's capital account and financial items surplus last year are not comparable to the statistics for 2008, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) said Monday.

The statistics released Friday showed China's capital account and financial items surplus rocketed 474 percent year-on-year to $109.1 billion in 2009.

But SAFE could not deduct errors from the statistics for 2009 until more complete figures, like securities investment, were collected from other departments, Guan Tao, director of Balance of Payments Department at SAFE, said.

Since the statistics of capital account in 2008 were error-adjusted, the two years' statistics could not be compared with each other, he said.

Corrected statistics for the 2009 surplus will be released in April, he added.

But Guan did admit that capital influx, a major component of the capital account surplus, increased last year, attributing the rise to the return of Chinese banks' assets invested abroad before the financial crisis hit.

Moreover, the surge was also attributable to the increase of capital Chinese companies raised in foreign countries and more investment from qualified foreign institutional investors (QFII) last year.

The capital account, also known as the financial account, tracks the movement of capital for investment and loans into and out of a country.