Now that the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank’s (AIIB) founding members have been announced, GTR catches up with Nicholas Lardy, Anthony M. Solomon senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, on the bank’s next steps.

Seen by some as a potential competitor to other multilaterals such as the World Bank or the Asian Development Bank, the AIIB has gathered global support, with even European countries wanting to be part of its founding members.

Though certain concerns have been raised – particularly in the US – regarding the standards the bank would operate on, Lardy believes the AIIB is striving to base its charter on the highest international standards, which explains why countries that initially weren’t expected to join, applied for membership.

Regarding the next step, the China-led AIIB now needs to finalise its charter and determine the voting power of each of its founding members. “The only thing we know right now is that European countries will be limited to 25% of the votes; 75% of the votes will be for Asian members,” Lardy says.