Europe remains favourite destination for Chinese investors - Europe is still the favourite destination of Chinese investors. This was revealed in the most recent A Capital pension fund's Dragon Index, which identifies and presents operations carried out by Chinese investors abroad. This is, above all, clear with regard to industrial investment where, in 2012, 86% of this kind of investment was in Europe. In the context of investments made overall, Europe was the target of 33% of mergers and acquisitions operations worth a total amount of $12.6 billion ($10.4 billion in 2011). The total amount for Chinese mergers and acquisitions operations worldwide has been calculated at $37.8 billion (+26% compared to 2011 figures). Chinese investors were particularly attracted by the United Kingdom ($4.1 billion), well ahead of Germany ($959 million) or France ($523 million). Europe is also way ahead of the US (14% of operations worth $5.4 billion) although this is a 40% increase. The many different barriers to Chinese investors in the US could explain this situation. The indicator also illustrates a collapse in transactions made in Asia (-65%), mainly because of the lack of large-scale operations, particularly with Australia. The biggest operation of this kind last year was only worth $425 million, as opposed to $2.5 billion the previous year. State-owned enterprises still remain the biggest investors but which are increasingly taking minority stakes (in 58% of mergers and acquisitions in 2012 as opposed to 43% a year earlier). According to a study carried out by the Economist Intelligence Unit, China has also diversified its investment destinations: from 17 destinations in 2005, China had 63 different destinations last year, which brings the total number of countries in which it is active to 119. (IL/transl.fl)