Historical rates of return on investments have received increasing scholarly attention in recent years. Much literature has focused especially on colonies, where institutions have been argued to facilitate severe exploitation. In the present study, we examine the return on investments in an Asian colony, British Malaya, from 1889 to 1969 for a large sample of companies. Our results suggest that the return on investments in Malaya might have been among the highest in the world during the period studied. Nevertheless, this finding fits badly with theories of imperial exploitation and can only to a limited extent be explained by a higher risk premium. Instead, we argue that the main driver of the very high return on investments in Malaya was rather the substantial rise in global market prices of the output of the two main sectors of the Malayan economy, rubber and tin. The way that the process of decolonization unfolded in Malaya did, furthermore, not lead to any major nationalization of foreign-held assets, and did thereby not disrupt the return on investment in the region in the same way as decolonization did to the return on investment in some other colonies.

近年来，历史的投资回报率越来越受到学术界的关注。许多文献特别关注殖民地，在这些殖民地中，有人主张采用各种制度来促进严重剥削。在本研究中，我们研究了1889年至1969年在亚洲殖民地英国马来亚的大量公司的投资回报。我们的结果表明，在所研究的时期内，马来亚的投资回报率可能是世界上最高的。然而，这一发现与帝国主义剥削理论非常不符，只能在有限的程度上用较高的风险溢价来解释。反而，我们认为，马来亚高投资回报率的主要驱动力是马来亚经济的两个主要部门橡胶和锡的全球市场价格大幅上涨。此外，马来亚非殖民化进程的开展并没有导致外国持有资产的任何重大国有化，因此并没有像非殖民化对投资回报的影响那样破坏该地区的投资回报。在其他一些殖民地。