On the face of it, China might not seem the obvious place to invest at the moment. The local stock market has collapsed, property markets are weak and the interest rate on bank deposits is about half the rate of inflation.

Yet that has not prevented a record flood of capital inflows even higher than China’s huge accumulation of reserves in recent years. In the first quarter, foreign exchange reserves rose by $154bn (€98bn, £78bn). On top of that, according to usually reliable figures leaked to Reuters, reserves jumped by $75bn in April and $40bn in May to a total of $1,800bn.