The nature of China’s continuing global acquisition spree is simple enough to fathom.

To amass externally all the ingredients essential for its relentless internal economic growth. To achieve as much Beijing has and continues to send its wealth to every continent. To places it must be added, where FDI & indeed FPI was long denied, because it didn’t serve “western interests”. Denied to the cost of undeveloped nations which are now benefiting from China’s capitalist opportunism.

Be in no doubt there’s no benevolence in Beijing’s behaviour, just pure unadulterated self-interest. Have no less doubt China’s monetary takeovers are a darn sight more welcoming than when the old guard – yes mostly European, but in more modern times, the US – used forceful military or Covert versions, to Colonise, apt alternatives for the C in CIA?

With Cs in mind please consider CPEC, in which China’s ambitions towards Pakistan is in plain sight with the 2nd C. China has committed to Pakistan because it provides a Corridor to the Arabian Sea and Gulf of Oman. To be clear by turning its attention to Pakistan, China turned its back on Sri Lanka- just as it has abandoned Angola post 2022. Abandoned these not out of any malice, but because using Pakistan as a land corridor was a darn sight commercially more sensible than the much longer sea journey via Sri Lanka.

And buying from the distressed seller, Russia, means oil cheaper than Angola’s.

As for why Pakistan wasn’t invested in ahead of Sri Lanka, well China chose to bide its time. Though the CPEC was discussed back in 2013 and its MOU in 2015, its details didn’t begin to emerge until 2017. The reality has been Beijing being very careful in bringing into its own sphere of commercially strategic interest, nations ‘The West’ had long considered “one of its own”.

In identifying where China is spreading its wealth around the world I could have performed the same exercise for other nations. After all Norway has been spreading its energy wealth, and so too have Australia, NZ and Canada, been liberally deploying their own sovereign wealth-piles around the world. For that matter when you notice PE giants investing their ‘funds’, please ask yourself “might that capital actually originate in China?” after all the false flag trick is a time-honoured form of disguise.

The exercise of examining where the world’s sovereign/pension wealth is being invested overseas, is particularly instructive in identifying favoured destinations. And one target in particular stands out, the UK. Oh, yes it does.

On almost all meaningful metrics, the UK, has and continues to be the stand-out per capita destination for the world’s hard earned and much prized sovereign and pension wealth. I challenge you to tell me where else? Indeed, rather than the UK’s dismal politics and over lose BoE in some way deterring such capital injections, the plight of the pound has proven to be more an affordability attraction, than a form of red flag discouragement.

So yes, the UK has yet another “here today, gone tomorrow” poor Government. The issue is that the short-term nature of the UK’s “in office but not in power” and inevitably has-been politicians, haven’t been poor ENOUGH, to deter the pension and other multi-generational riches from around the world, looking to the UK for long-term investment security.

So, when you next read the UK is being abandoned by human & financial capital, please ask yourself. Why are Norwegians, Australians, Canadians, Singaporeans, the Chinese, etc., still sending their hard earned and much cherished capital to it?

PS The ‘IF’s, and no buts’ of China’s global acquisition spree

Earning considerably from exporting goods around the world, China has dispensed an ever-increasing amount of its capital on a global acquisition spree. In choosing where to deploy this hard-earned wealth one could say Beijing has adopted the “Rule of IF”.

IF there is an asset anywhere around the world which gives Beijing access to:

• a natural resource essential for China’s internal growth, it will be a target
• the financial services essential for its internal growth, it will be a target
• products or services which Chinese households will consume at home or on their travels, it will be a target

So, whether it is acquiring stakes in ClubMed, Starwood or Hilton Hotels, the Leadenhall Building, Smithfield Foods or mines, quarries, oil wells or arable land spread extensively around the world, there should be no IF’s or BUT’s as to why capital is leaving China; it is not part of an evacuation from it but an invasion of others.

And though China has not always when investing, done so by openly “waving its own flag”, there are NO IF or BUTS concerning how across all Developed Economies the UK has been THE PREFERRED PER CAPITA destination, albeit not OVERTLY, for Beijing’s “sovereign” capital.

Make no mistake the UK is not a has been but a continue to be destination for Beijing’s capital; albeit to repeat, as in the past, it not always being DIRECTLY obvious that the investment comes from China. After all, where else across Developed Economies and certainly Europe, would you claim the grass greener and investment more fertile for Beijing, than Britain?

This article was originally published by QuantMetriks.