BEIJING — Overseas investors have been increasing their holdings of Chinese bonds, demonstrating unabated confidence in the country's market, despite the COVID-19 outbreak, official data showed.

As of the end of June, the total amount of yuan bonds owned by overseas institutions under the depository of the China Central Depository & Clearing Co Ltd (CCDC) surged 33.48 percent year-on-year to about 2.2 trillion yuan (about $311.6 billion), the CCDC said.

The amount was up 3.93 percent, or 82.9 billion yuan, from May, representing a 19-month rising streak since December 2018, according to the data.

The Chinese bonds held by international investors rose 17 percent in June compared with the end of 2019.

The strong growth in overseas holdings of yuan bonds was in part boosted by the Bond Connect program, a market-access scheme launched in July 2017 that allows overseas investors to invest in the Chinese mainland's interbank bond market using financial institutions of the mainland and Hong Kong.