By the end of September, the country's external debt reached US$441.95 billion (HK$3.45 trillion), a US$68.33 billion increase from the end of last year.

Outstanding short-term debts - debt with maturities of less than one year - have increased 27.24 percent over the nine-month period to US$280.04 billion, accounting for 63.37 percent of total debts.

Meanwhile, medium- to long- term debts increased moderately by 5.45 percent to US$161.91 billion. In the three months from July to September, mid- to long- term debts had a minor decrease of US$0.16 billion.

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The SAFE statistics did not specify further details of short-term debts. But actions indicated foreign exchange loans by banks are one of the major reasons for the rapid growth as scale of such loans was restricted by SAFE in early April, according to an earlier Bloomberg report.

The over 60 percent proportion of short-term debts is well over the international alert line of 25 percent. But it is not yet considered an instant risk, as China holds the world's largest foreign exchange reserve - close to US$1.9 trillion - which just experienced its first drop since December 2003.

SAFE remained cautious on foreign debts all through the year, applying several detailed restrictions.