The EU has become the most attractive destination for Chinese investment due to consistent progress of the China-EU bilateral relationship. Meanwhile, China has called for a better and sound investment environment in the EU market.
Up to 78.63 percent of the surveyed Chinese companies listed the EU as their top investment target, and 43.59 percent of the respondents said they would increase their investment in the EU in the future, which is 5.13 percentage points higher than the previous survey, according to a report that the Academy of China Council for the Promotion of International Trade (CCPIT) sent to the Global Times on Wednesday.
China and the EU have reached cooperation in more than 100 sectors, and Chinese firms had set up over 2,900 ventures in the EU as of the end of 2017, CCPIT said.
A joint statement of the 21st China-EU Summit issued on April 9 said that an advanced bilateral investment treaty is likely to be reached next year, and the two sides promised to grant each other broader, non-discriminatory and more convenient market access.
However, the EU is now tightening foreign investment scrutiny while some countries have substantially raised their threshold for market access, and both the instability of foreign investment policies and unfair treatment toward Chinese investment have harmed investment into the EU, CCPIT noted.
Analysis indicates that Chinese direct investment in the EU decreased to $19.4 billion (17.3 billion euros) in 2018, down 40 percent from the previous year and the lowest level since 2014, according to a report released by New York-based research company Rhodium Group in March.
Meanwhile, another analysis issued by the Rhodium Group in January forecast that Chinese investment would increase in 2019 as there were rising number of transactions worth $20 billion in the beginning of the year.
