President Donald Trump has a Chinese bank account and spent years pursuing business projects in China, the New York Times has reported.

The account is controlled by Trump International Hotels Management and paid local taxes between 2013 and 2015.

According to a Trump spokesman, the account was set up “to explore the potential for hotel deals in Asia”.

President Trump has been critical of US companies doing business in China and sparked a trade war between the two countries.

The New York Times revealed after obtaining President Trump’s tax records, which included both personal and company financial details.

The newspaper’s previous reports show he paid $750 in US federal taxes in 2016 and 2017, when he became president.

The Chinese bank account has paid out $188,561 in local taxes.

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President Trump has been critical of presidential candidate rival Joe Biden and his policies towards China in the lead-up to the US election, taking place on November 3.

The Trump administration has singled out Joe Biden’s son Hunter and made unsubstantiated claims about his dealings with China. Joe Biden’s income tax returns and public financial disclosures show no business dealings connected to China.

Alan Garten, a lawyer for the Trump Organization, described the NY Times story as “pure speculation” and said that it made “incorrect assumptions”.

He told the paper that Trump International Hotels Management had “opened an account with a Chinese bank having offices in the United States in order to pay the local taxes”.

He said: “No deals, transactions or other business activities ever materialized and, since 2015, the office has remained inactive.”

“Though the bank account remains open, it has never been used for any other purpose,” Alan Garten told the NY Times.

Donald Trump has multiple business interests both in the US and overseas. These include golf courses in Scotland and Ireland and a chain of five-star luxury hotels.

The NY Times reported that President Trump maintains foreign bank accounts in China, Britain and Ireland.

In August, the president said he wanted to offer tax credits to entice US companies to move factories out of China.

He also threatened to strip government contracts from firms that continue to outsource work to China.

In a speech, President Trump vowed to create 10 million jobs in 10 months, saying “we will end our reliance on China”.