Chinese Investments in Italy in energy from renewable sources

Abstract

In recent years Chinese presence in Italian market has grown at a very fast pace, becoming an important player in Italian economy. Quantify the dimension of these investments is one of the most common questions asked by economists, politicians and public opinion in general. A complete, exhaustive analysis on the dimension of investments in Italy is impossible for several reasons. The first is the dimension itself of such investments, being very big, and second, they are in many sectors in all the country. Furthermore, a database on these investments does not exist. It is quite impossible to define exactly how much money China invested in Italy. Write off a document identifying the dimension of Chinese investments in Italy is not the aim of this work. In this work the focus has been put on just one sector in which Chinese companies invested, the production of Energy from renewable sources. Starting from this point I analyzed the companies in Italy financed by Chinese investors, their dimension, revenues and profitability, and compared the results with companies in the same sector, similar for dimension and revenues to see if there were similarities also in profitability. The analysis is not just limited to the profitability of the Chinese run companies, but attention has also been put on the Chinese parent companies, analyzing their business in China and in the rest of the world, to better understand the reasons beside the choice to invest in Italy.