Category: Finance

China and the Bretton Woods Institutions

By Gregory T. Chin and Kevin P. Gallagher The global economic order is undergoing significant change, especially as it pertains to the Global South. In the 20th century, the legacy Bretton Woods Institutions (BWIs) served as one of the only sources ...

IMF Meetings Begin Under Fresh Cloud of U.S.-China Trade Tensions

The IMF and World Bank's semi-annual gathering of finance ministers and central bank governors got underway in Washington on Monday, against the backdrop of new trade threats between the world's two largest economies. Last week, China unveiled new export restrictions on ...

Kenya Swaps $3.5 Billion in Chinese Railway Debt From Dollars to Yuan, Cutting Costs and Boosting Beijing’s RMB Push

Kenya and China have agreed to restructure the East African country's loan portfolio by converting an estimated $3.5 billion of outstanding debts from U.S. dollars into Chinese yuan. The amount is believed to be the remainder of more than $6 billion of ...

Indonesia Prepares for Pivotal Talks on Expanding China-Financed ‘Whoosh’ High-Speed Railway

When the Jakarta-Bandung high-speed rail, known as the Whoosh, opened in October 2023, it quickly drew scrutiny. China provided billions in loans, KCIC—the China-Indonesia joint venture operating the line—reported losses, and parent companies like the state-owned PT Kereta Api Indonesia (KAI) absorbed significant deficits. Critics ...

Indonesia’s Infrastructure Minister Beijing Visit: Key Takeaways

Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono (AHY), Indonesia’s coordinating minister for infrastructure, traveled to Beijing in late August to meet President Xi Jinping and senior Chinese officials. The visit, carried out on behalf of President Prabowo Subianto, was focused on sustaining Indonesia–China dialogue on strategic infrastructure.  ...

Analysis from Cobus van Staden

How to Lure Chinese Financing Back to the Global South: Report

Global South countries face increasing financing pressure, endangering their ability to keep developing while also implementing measures to deal with a growing climate crisis. The disruption of global trade is coupled with a larger megatrend: flows of international capital to the developing world have turned negative. This means that countries are now routinely paying more to service loans than they receive in disbursements.

The vast majority of Global South borrowers ...

China’s Lending to the Global South Has Been Growing More Commercial

By Yunnan Chen Development finance has been embattled of late. Aid cutbacks have raised alarm over financing for climate and development goals. The most notable example is the egregious dismantling of the US Agency for ...

How China Really Secures Its Loans to Developing Countries

The "debt trap" meme claims that China is intentionally lending vast sums of money to poor developing countries in Africa, and elsewhere, with the express intent to seize physical assets in those countries when they inevitably can't repay their debts.

Eyes Turn to China as the West Steps Back From Development

By Tim Hirschel-Burns With the notable exception of the United States, all other 192 members of the United Nations agreed on an agenda for financing the United Nations' 2030 Sustainable Development Goals’ (SDGs). In important respects, the agreement on the

A Peer-to-Peer Pivot in China’s Overseas Development Finance

By Rebecca Ray In 2024, China extended $6.1 billion in 20 commitments in public and publicly guaranteed (PPG) loans, according to a new update to the China’s Overseas Development Finance (CODF) Database managed by the Boston University Global Development Policy ...

It’s Payback Time For a Lot of Those Chinese Loans

Borrowers in Africa and other developing regions are expected to repay $35 billion of Chinese loans this year, with two-thirds of the amount coming from the world's poorest countries. Many of these debts were taken out in the mid-2010s and are ...

Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank Appoints “Tiger-Fighter’ as New Leader

The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank has appointed a new leader. Zou Jiayi, a former Vice Finance Minister and anti-corruption official, was elected as the new leader of the development bank, which functions as a China-centric version of the World Bank. She replaces Jin Liqun, the founding ...

China Floats Ideas for “Multipolar” Currency System to Balance U.S. Dollar

China announced several new initiatives aimed at increasing global trade in the yuan and to hedge against the dominance of the U.S. dollar. Pan Gongsheng, the governor of the People’s Bank of China, proposed a future where the global financial system would rely on several currencies.
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