When, in years gone by, the head of China Development Bank, Chen Yuan, went abroad, his hosts literally rolled out the red carpet. A banker, after all, is a more useful visitor than an emperor, as bankers give out more money. And when the visiting banker is Chinese, the terms are likely to be more generous, too.

Mr Chen advanced billions of dollars to countries from Angola to Venezuela — and to companies from Brazil’s Petrobras to Anil Ambani’s Reliance Communications in India. These borrowers then gave orders to many Chinese companies, paid for with CDB’s capital: groups such as Huawei, China Metallurgical Group, China State Construction and Engineering and the state-owned enterprises in natural resources. This lending was all about vendor financing. In essence, it was no different to what many countries do to support their local champions and domestic jobs. It was just the scale that was extraordinary.

Now, Chen Yuan has retired from CDB and the bank is more focused on the domestic front, financing affordable housing. In its place, however, a new generation of financial institutions has been established in a flurry of recent initiatives: the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank, the Brics New Development Bank, and the Silk Road Plan. Combined, they have almost $100bn of committed capital from Beijing (and counting).