China estimate of the day

From The Wall Street Journal:

Over the past decade, China rushed to buy up global commodities as its economy boomed—both to feed its factories and to ensure it wasn’t reliant on Western powers for raw materials. China’s overseas investments in resources soared to $53.3 billion last year, from $8.2 billion in 2005…

China came late to the global resources boom and often overpaid for assets Western companies had passed over or wanted to sell. China typically paid one-fifth more for oil-and-gas assets than the industry average, estimates Scott Darling, Asian regional head of oil-and-gas research at J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.

…Last year, the head of China’s mining association estimated that 80% of all overseas mining deals had failed, though he didn’t elaborate, according to state media.

The full story, by Wayne Arnold, is very interesting and quite thorough, use news.google.com if you have to.