China holds most government-to-government loans in 36 countries

Claim types Fact

World Bank, International Debt Statistics (IDS): public and publicly guaranteed external debt owed to bilateral (government) creditors, stock outstanding at end of year, current US$ (DT.DOD.BLAT.CD), creditor China (counterpart 730) and all bilateral creditors (World), as reported by each borrowing country; read from the World Bank IDS API via the progrss vault (vault rule GUIDELINES §4.11). Bilateral debt covers loans from governments and their official agencies (for China this includes its policy banks); it excludes debt to multilateral lenders (World Bank, IMF, regional banks) and to private bondholders and banks. Set: the 112 low- and middle-income countries reporting bilateral debt in both 2005 and 2025. Map colour: yellow = China holds more than half of the country's bilateral debt in 2025; hover shows China's share. A majority share was used instead of 'biggest creditor' because IDS names only the main creditor countries, so a majority is the share that guarantees China is first. Also above half in 2025 but outside the fixed set (no 2005 data): Equatorial Guinea, Montenegro, Suriname. Count by year: 4 (2005), 14 (2010), 37 (2015), 42 (2018 and 2019), 36 (2025). China itself reports bilateral debt to IDS and is included in the 112 (0% owed to China); excluding it changes no count. Shares and counts are progrss calculations from IDS data. The chart shows who is owed, not why loans were made.