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By Yin Lei

China had utilized 636.7 billion yuan (97.96 billion U.S. dollars) of foreign direct investments (FDI) by the end of September, a year-on-year growth of 2.9 percent, said the spokesperson of the Ministry of Commerce at a press conference on Thursday.

The number of new foreign-invested companies increased sharply for the past nine months.

In September, 4,591 such companies were set up in China, up by 45.7 percent year-on-year, financed by FDIs worth 76.27 billion yuan (11.46 billion U.S. dollars), up by 8 percent year-on-year. From January to September, China saw the establishment of 45,922 foreign-invested companies, 95.1 percent more than the same period in 2017.

From January to September, FDI inflows are better distributed among various targets.

In particular, inbound investments utilized by China’s manufacturing sectors snowballed, reaching 199.26 billion yuan (28.73 billion U.S. dollars), up by 9.6 percent year on year.

Of this amount, high-tech manufacturing received 64.74 billion yuan (9.33 billion U.S. dollars), up by 22.5 percent year on year. Specifically, electronic and telecommunications equipment, computers and office equipment, and healthcare devices, instruments and equipment respectively saw a year-on-year jump of 37.5 percent, 72.8 percent and 64.1 percent.

Contributions from China’s major sources of FDIs maintained rapid growth, with a 169.8-percent jump from the United Kingdom and a 41.5-percent rise from South Korea. Investment inflows from the Belt and Road countries were up by 14.9 percent year on year.