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Since the open-up policy at the end of the 1970s, China – the largest single market in Asia – received growing attention from foreign investors and banks. However, the fragile domestic market and undeveloped financial system in China did not allow a rapid inflow of foreign banks, given that the foreign banks could exert suppression on the domestic banks. As a result, it took several years for most foreign banks to gain a foothold in mainland China. This article demonstrates how Commerzbank – one of the German Big Three – entered the Chinese market in the 1980s by establishing a branch in Hong Kong and opening a representative office in Beijing. On the basis of archival evidence and other contemporary sources, the case of China provides one slice of the history of Commerzbank’s expansion and illustrates how it coped with the surge of internationalisation in the 1980s.

After the end of the First World War in November 1918, the Allies were involved in a military campaign in the Ottoman lands, leading to a national resistance by Turks that would end in 1923. It is relevant to provide actual information on the outcomes of the Turkish War of Independence, since it was a longlived event that paved the way for further problems on the belligerents’ economies. Using unique data for the value of the gold from 1919 to 1925 at the İstanbul bourse, our analysis complements the historical arguments as historians may find political risks difficult to quantify. We observe that in 1921 the Turkish victories created expectations on the part of traders that the war could end soon, as is manifested in exchange rate fluctuations. The Turkish economy would have experienced higher financial instability with the Allies’ occupation and resistance in 1920, creating a lower chance to return the pre-war gold content of the belligerents’ currencies.

Over two decades from 1949 until the resumption of the diplomatic relations between these two countries in 1972, West German companies never gave up on the Chinese market despite substantial difficulties caused by Cold War frictions. This paper exams the payment transactions and terms of credits for financing industrial projects between the PRC and West German companies.