British banks are far more exposed to China's economic quagmire than any of their competitors

With China's economic expansion slowing more rapidly than many analysts expected a few years ago, and global growth so feeble, investors are more interested than ever in how the emerging behemoth fits into the world's financial system.

A note from Renaissance Macro tries to spell out one answer to that question, showing which countries' banking systems are most heavily exposed to China. One country stands out.

The UK not only has a higher exposure to China as a proportion of GDP, it's larger than any of the competitor nations in nominal terms.

Here's how it looks:

Renaissance Macro

In fact, UK banks have more exposure to China than those in the euro area, US and Japan combined, With a total of $540 billion (POUNDS) it's not far off UK exposure to the euro area, which is quite amazing given the how much closer the eurozone and UK are in terms of geography and trade.

That goes some way to explain why Chancellor George Osborne bet big on China's economy during his trip there this week.