Chinese companies continued to invest big in the overseas market in the first quarter (Q1) of the year, the Ministry of Commerce said Thursday.

The data showed that China's non-financial outbound direct investment (ODI) surged 55.4 percent from a year ago to 261.74 billion yuan (US$40.34 billion) in Q1.

Hong Kong attracted the most investment from the Chinese mainland, accounting for 51.6 percent of the total, while investment to the United States more than doubled to US$5.24 billion. ASEAN received a total of US$2.29 billion of investment, up 44 percent year on year.

Some US$5.4 billion was invested in manufacturing in Q1, up 125.9 percent, with nearly half of that channeled to equipment manufacturing.

Chinese firms spent US$16.56 billion on overseas acquisitions, covering 15 industries and 36 countries and regions.

The ministry said the "Belt and Road" initiative was a major push to business cooperation between Chinese and foreign firms. ODI to countries involved in the initiative was US$3.59 billion, an increase of 40.2 percent year on year.

ODI in March rose 21.5 percent year on year to 66.4 billion yuan.

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