Seventy percent of overseas Chinese enterprises are "in the black," according to an investigation conducted by the Ministry of Commerce, the China Business News reported today.?

Statistics from a bulletin compiled by the Ministry of Commerce, the National Bureau of Statistics, and the State Administration of Foreign Exchange show that China's outbound foreign direct investment (FDI) reached US$21.16 billion in 2006.?
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The country's FDI to financial sectors reached US$3.53 billion last year, accounting for 16.7 percent of the total, while the FDI to non-financial sectors was up 43.8 percent year on year to US$17.63 billion, representing 83.3 percent.?
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"We expected the country's outward investment to reach US$60 billion during the 11th Five-Year Program period (2006-10). Now we believe the actual figure will be much higher than that," said Chen Lin, deputy director of the ministry's foreign economic cooperation department.?
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Meanwhile, the ministry's 2006 statistics suggest overseas non-financial Chinese enterprises' sales revenues totaled US$274.6 billion, and they paid US$2.82 billion in taxes.
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Domestic investment firms realized a total import and export value of US$92.5 billion through overseas firms they invested in.?
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According to the investigation, roughly 40 percent of China's outward FDI was carried out through mergers and acquisitions.
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Businesses services, mining, finance, retail and wholesale sectors accounted for 70 percent of the nation's outward FDI last year. Meanwhile, 90 percent of China's non-financial outward FDI went to Asia and Latin America. Of that 90 percent, China's Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Cayman Islands and British Virgin Islands received 81.5 percent.?
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China's outward investment provided over 200,000 jobs for people in foreign countries last year.
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As of the end of 2006, more than 5,000 local investment entities had established nearly 10,000 overseas firms in 172 countries and regions.

(China Daily September 17, 2007)