KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 20): Malaysia and China's bilateral trade has hit another record high, rising to US$124 billion (about RM503 billion) for the full year 2019, said China's Ambassador to Malaysia Bai Tian.

Citing Chinese customer statistics, Bai said this is a 14.2% increase in bilateral trade from 2018's figure of US$108.66 billion (RM443 billion). China remains Malaysia's largest trading partner, followed by Singapore and the United States.

"Part of the huge bilateral trade is linked to the investments coming in, because when Chinese investors come to Malaysia to set up factories, they buy equipment from China. Once production increases, a portion of those products are then sold back to China in large percentages.