China was considering purchasing at most US$50 billion of bonds issued by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) told Xinhua on Friday.

The SAFE said China considered investing no more than US$50 billion to buy the IMF bonds "on the basis of safety and reasonable returns".

The administration said China was ready to play an active role in IMF's endeavour to explore ways to raise financing resources through market methods.

Figures released last month by the SAFE showed that China's foreign financial assets increased by 23 percent from 2007 to US$2.92 trillion by the end of 2008.

(Xinhua News Agency June 6, 2009)