Lou Jiwei, the head of China Investment Corp, said on Thursday he would like to emulate sovereign wealth funds that have invested in large western financial institutions hurt by the credit crisis, but that such investments were still a year away.

He told a forum in Beijing on Thursday that investors such as Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund, which paid $7.5bn for 4.9 per cent of Citigroup this week, acted as a stabilising force in the market.