IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/imf/imfwpa/2006-265.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

What’s Driving Investment in China?

Author

Listed:
  • Mr. Steven A Barnett
  • Mr. R. Brooks

Abstract

Investment has grown rapidly in China in recent years, reaching more than 40 percent of GDP. Despite good progress on bank and enterprise reforms, weaknesses remain that could contribute to inefficient investment decisions. Manufacturing, infrastructure, and real estate have been the drivers of fixed asset investment. Econometric analysis presented in the paper suggests that manufacturing investment is strongly correlated with firms' liquidity, largely retained earnings. Analysis of residential real estate investment shows that it is weakly correlated with real household income growth and real mortgage interest rates. A policy implication of these findings is that reducing liquidity in firms, for example by requiring state-owned enterprises to pay dividends to the government, and using monetary policy to reduce liquidity increase real interest rates, would slow investment in manufacturing and real estate.

Suggested Citation

  • Mr. Steven A Barnett & Mr. R. Brooks, 2006. "What’s Driving Investment in China?," IMF Working Papers 2006/265, International Monetary Fund.
    • Handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:2006/265
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.aspx?sk=20067
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Eswar Prasad & Shang-Jin Wei, 2007. "The Chinese Approach to Capital Inflows: Patterns and Possible Explanations," NBER Chapters, in: Capital Controls and Capital Flows in Emerging Economies: Policies, Practices, and Consequences, pages 421-480, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Liu Hongyu & Yun W. Park & Zheng Siqi, 2002. "The Interaction between Housing Investment and Economic Growth in China," International Real Estate Review, Global Social Science Institute, vol. 5(1), pages 40-60.
    3. Wensheng Peng & Matthew Yiu & Dickson Tam, 2005. "The Property Market and the Macroeconomy of the Mainland: A Cross Region Study," Working Papers 0512, Hong Kong Monetary Authority.
    4. Shang-Jin Wei & Ms. Genevieve Boyreau-Debray, 2004. "Can China Grow Faster? A Diagnosis of the Fragmentation of Its Domestic Capital Market," IMF Working Papers 2004/076, International Monetary Fund.
    5. Sean Dougherty & Richard Herd, 2005. "Fast-Falling Barriers and Growing Concentration: The Emergence of a Private Economy in China," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 471, OECD Publishing.
    6. Kuijs, Louis, 2005. "Investment and saving in China," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3633, The World Bank.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Kahrl, Fredrich & Roland-Holst, David & Zilberman, David, 2013. "Past as Prologue? Understanding energy use in post-2002 China," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 759-771.
    2. Tang, Ya & Xu, Jianguo & Zhang, Xun, 2017. "China's investment and rate of return on capital revisited," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 12-25.
    3. C Niranjan Rao, 2008. "The Role of Intellectual Property Rights in Information and Communication Technologies," Working Papers id:1742, eSocialSciences.
    4. Lv, Bingyang & Liu, Yongzheng & Li, Yan, 2020. "Fiscal incentives, competition, and investment in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 59(C).
    5. Lipschitz, Leslie & Rochon, Céline & Verdier, Geneviève, 2011. "A real model of transitional growth and competitiveness in China," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(4), pages 267-283, August.
    6. Jahangir Aziz, 2008. "Deconstructing China’s and India’s Growth: The Role of Financial Policies," Working Papers id:1714, eSocialSciences.
    7. Mr. Leslie Lipschitz & Ms. Genevieve Verdier & Ms. Celine Rochon, 2008. "A Real Model of Transitional Growth and Competitiveness in China," IMF Working Papers 2008/099, International Monetary Fund.
    8. Ohno, Sanae & Shimizu, Junko, 2015. "Do exchange rate arrangements and capital controls influence international capital flows and housing prices in Asia?," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 1-18.
    9. Mr. Jahangir Aziz, 2006. "Rebalancing China’s Economy: What Does Growth Theory Tell Us?," IMF Working Papers 2006/291, International Monetary Fund.
    10. Mylène Gaulard, 2010. "Baixa da taxa de lucro e crescimento chinês ," Post-Print halshs-01811556, HAL.
    11. Mali Chivakul & Bernhard Kassner, 2019. "Can Consumption Growth in China Keep Up as Investment Slows?," Comparative Economic Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Association for Comparative Economic Studies, vol. 61(3), pages 381-412, September.
    12. He, Dong & Zhang, Wenlang, 2010. "How dependent is the Chinese economy on exports and in what sense has its growth been export-led?," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 87-104, February.
    13. Roberts, Ivan & Rush, Anthony, 2012. "Understanding China's demand for resource imports," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 23(3), pages 566-579.
    14. Tao Gu, 2020. "The behavior of private entrepreneurs in an imperfect financial market," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 40(1), pages 349-358.
    15. Arslan Razmi, 2008. "Is the Chinese Investment- and Export-Led Growth Model Sustainable? Some Rising Concerns," UMASS Amherst Economics Working Papers 2008-09, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Department of Economics.
    16. Mr. Jahangir Aziz, 2008. "Real and Financial Sector Linkages in China and India," IMF Working Papers 2008/095, International Monetary Fund.
    17. Gu, Tao, 2019. "Wage determination and fixed capital investment in an imperfect financial market: the case of China," MPRA Paper 95986, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Arvind Virmani, 2009. "China’s Socialist Market Economy: Lessons for Democratic Developing Countries," Working Papers id:1899, eSocialSciences.
    2. Menzie D. Chinn, 2012. "Imbalances, Overheating and the Prospects for Global Recovery," Chapters, in: Maurice Obstfeld & Dongchul Cho & Andrew Mason (ed.), Global Economic Crisis, chapter 6, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    3. Dollar, David & Kraay, Aart, 2006. "Neither a borrower nor a lender: Does China's zero net foreign asset position make economic sense?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(5), pages 943-971, July.
    4. Lipschitz, Leslie & Rochon, Céline & Verdier, Geneviève, 2011. "A real model of transitional growth and competitiveness in China," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(4), pages 267-283, August.
    5. John Knight & Sai Ding, 2010. "Why Does China Invest So Much?," Asian Economic Papers, MIT Press, vol. 9(3), pages 87-117, Fall.
    6. Arvind Virmani, 2005. "China's Socialist Market Economy: Lessons of Success," Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations, New Delhi Working Papers 178, Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations, New Delhi, India.
    7. Philip R. Lane & Sergio L. Schmukler, 2006. "The international financial integration of China and India," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue Jun.
    8. Bellavite Pellegrini, Carlo & Pellegrini, Laura & Sergi, Bruno, 2018. "Governance and banking system morphology in China: the evolution over the last two decades (1995-2015)," MPRA Paper 98571, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 2018.
    9. Arvind Virmani, 2006. "China’s Socialist Market Economy - Lessons Of Success," Macroeconomics Working Papers 22274, East Asian Bureau of Economic Research.
    10. Joshua Aizenman & Jaewoo Lee, 2007. "International Reserves: Precautionary Versus Mercantilist Views, Theory and Evidence," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 18(2), pages 191-214, April.
    11. Olena Havrylchyk & Sandra Poncet, 2007. "Foreign Direct Investment in China: Reward or Remedy?," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(11), pages 1662-1681, November.
    12. Mr. Il Houng Lee & Mr. Murtaza H Syed & Mr. Liu Xueyan, 2013. "China’s Path to Consumer-Based Growth: Reorienting Investment and Enhancing Efficiency," IMF Working Papers 2013/083, International Monetary Fund.
    13. Franklin Allen & Jun & Chenying Zhang & Mengxin Zhao, 2012. "China's Financial System: Opportunities and Challenges," NBER Chapters, in: Capitalizing China, pages 63-143, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Ning, Ye & Zhang, Lingxiang, 2018. "Modeling dynamics of short-term international capital flows in China: A Markov regime switching approach," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 193-203.
    15. Tam, Leona & Dholakia, Utpal M., 2011. "Delay and duration effects of time frames on personal savings estimates and behavior," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 114(2), pages 142-152, March.
    16. Guariglia, Alessandra & Poncet, Sandra, 2008. "Could financial distortions be no impediment to economic growth after all? Evidence from China," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(4), pages 633-657, December.
    17. Sai Ding & John Knight, 2011. "Why has China Grown So Fast? The Role of Physical and Human Capital Formation," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 73(2), pages 141-174, April.
    18. Richard Herd & Sean Dougherty, 2007. "Growth Prospects in China and India Compared," European Journal of Comparative Economics, Cattaneo University (LIUC), vol. 4(1), pages 65-89, June.
    19. Zhang, Yanbing & Hua, Xiuping & Zhao, Liang, 2011. "Monetary policy and housing prices : a case study of Chinese experience in 1999-2010," BOFIT Discussion Papers 17/2011, Bank of Finland, Institute for Economies in Transition.
    20. David Greenaway & Alessandra Guariglia & Zhihong Yu, 2014. "The more the better? Foreign ownership and corporate performance in China," The European Journal of Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(7-9), pages 681-702, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:2006/265. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Akshay Modi (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/imfffus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.