Why China Can't Stop Capital Outflows

How China manages its currency is likely to be the global economic story of 2017. Despite the government's best efforts, capital continues to leave the country at a brisk pace, with a balance-of-payments deficit through the third quarter of $469 billion. Attempts to arrest this flow probably won't work. But they may well create new risks.

Capital outflows began gathering steam in 2012, when the government liberalized current-account payment transactions in goods and services. Enterprising Chinese figured out that while they couldn't officially move money abroad to buy a house via the capital account -- individuals are barred from moving more than $50,000 out of the country each year -- they could create false trade invoices that would allow them to deposit money where they needed it. The result was a huge discrepancy between payments recorded for imports and the declared value of goods passing through customs, amounting to $526 billion in hidden outflows last year.