Does China have the means to expand abroad?

China is going to look to invest abroad, with Chinese companies seek ing to produce abroad both because of population ageing in China, which imposes the use of labour outside China, and because of rising production costs in China. This increase in production by Chinese companies outside China is leading to the development of transport infrastructure ( which is also used to supply China with raw materials), as embodied by the Belt and Road Initiative (also called the New Silk Road Initiative ) . But China’s problem risks being that it will lack the resources to invest abroad: Population ageing is driving down the savings rate, wiping out China’s external surplus; The renminbi cannot become an international reserve currency, which prevents China from having a sizeable external debt (unlike the United States); Foreign direct investment in China is declining due to rising production costs and the demise of global value chains; Private economic agents in China are exporting capital to the rest of the world, which reveals their pessimism. If China no longer has an external surplus, cannot accumulate external debt, receives little direct investment and is faced with private capital outflows, then it will not have the resources to invest massively abroad, which will curb its ambitions in terms of offshoring production and infrastructure investment.