BEIJING, July 17 -- China's outstanding foreign debt hit 10.28 trillion yuan (1.67 trillion U.S. dollars) by the end of March, the country's forex regulator said on Friday.

The amount does not include the outstanding external debt of the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions or that or Taiwan, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange said in a statement on its website.

Most of the debt owed to foreign creditors resulted from short-term borrowing, as outstanding external debt with a term of one year or less amounted to 7.24 trillion yuan, while long- and medium-term outstanding external debt came in at 3.04 trillion yuan.

In terms of currency structure, debt denominated in foreign currencies accounted for 51.9 percent of the outstanding external debt, and 80 percent of them are in U.S. dollars, compared to six percent in euros and four percent in Japanese yen.