China’s CITIC Antes Up $113 Billion for Silk Road Initiative

By Lauren Dodillet

Chinese state-owned conglomerate CITIC Ltd. announced last week that it will invest upwards of $113 billion dollars into China’s “One Belt, One Road” (aka the New Silk Road) initiative. The money will come from its banking, securities, trust, and construction divisions, and will be put toward the completion of approximately 300 projects from Singapore to Turkmenistan.

The New Silk Road is a planned network of infrastructure links across Asia, the Middle East, and Europe. Projects include the construction of railways, highways, power grids, pipelines, and Internet networks, to list a few. In March, Chinese President Xi Jinping said he hopes that annual trade between Silk Road countries will reach $2.5 trillion in the next ten years and bolster China’s trade connections to European and other Asian countries.

CITIC’s banking subsidiary, China CITIC Bank Corp., will contribute the majority of the funds with $65 billion dollars. The money will be disseminated through its local branches and help fund more than 200 projects in infrastructure, energy, and agriculture. CITIC’s securities, trust, and construction divisions will contribute the rest of the funds as equity and debt financing to more than 30 countries supported by the initiative.

(Photo by Toshihiro Oimatsu via Flickr)