BEIJING -- Overseas institutional investors bought more Chinese bonds in January, according to data from the China Foreign Exchange Trading System.

In January, overseas institutional investors bought 783.2 billion yuan ($123 billion) in Chinese bonds and sold 641.9 billion yuan, the data showed.

These transactions led to a net purchase of 141.3 billion yuan, 51.6 billion yuan higher compared with the previous month.

Last month, spot transactions of yuan bonds made by overseas institutional investors neared 1.43 trillion yuan, up 53 percent from December 2021.