China used about 50.15 billion US dollars of foreign investment in contracts in the first four months of this year, up 8.03 percent year-on-year, the Ministry of Commerce said Thursday.

Foreign investment in the period in real terms reached 17.47 billion dollars, up 2.24 percent.

From January to April, China approved 13,092 new foreign companies, down 8.11 percent over the same period of 2004.

By the end of 2004, China had used foreign investment of 560 billion dollars in real terms.

(Xinhua)