Sinosure in China’s overseas finance and the evolving international response

(ODI Global, London, 14 December 2023) This year old report explores the development of Sinosure as an institution and its involvement in China’s overseas lending and the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). This report makes two main contributions. First, it examines an understudied aspect of China’s BRI financing to show how the Chinese government uses Sinosure to hedge – or protect from – risk in its overseas lending and investment. Second, it contextualises Sinosure within the wider landscape of financial institutions providing guarantees and risk insurance, and the challenge and change that China’s state-backed finance has provoked. In several areas, development finance institutions (DFIs) and export credit agencies (ECAs) are adapting not only to Chinese competition but also to new demands on their mandates. The use of export credit within China’s wider official financing is a challenge to OECD regimes that separately govern finance for trade and for aid. Sinosure and other Chinese Export Credit Agencies offer highly favourable terms and longer-term finance, potentially undermining the ‘level playing field’ of the OECD.