{"id":308592,"date":"2026-02-25T00:32:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-25T00:32:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/308592\/"},"modified":"2026-02-25T00:32:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-25T00:32:12","slug":"why-chinas-path-to-financial-superpower-status-could-begin-in-hong-kong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/308592\/","title":{"rendered":"Why China\u2019s path to \u2018financial superpower\u2019 status could begin in Hong Kong"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Wilson Chan Fung-cheung joined Hong Kong\u2019s banking industry as a foreign-exchange trader more than four decades ago, his work involved US dollars, UK pounds, Japanese yen and various European and Asian currencies \u2013 but not Chinese yuan<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cBack then, there was no yuan trading at all as, in fact, the internationalisation of the yuan only started in 2009,\u201d recalled Chan, who has worked for various Chinese banks.<\/p>\n

Beijing\u2019s decision that year to promote its currency for wider use in trade, investment and other fundraising activities was a game-changer for Hong Kong, which rapidly became an offshore yuan hub, he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cNowadays, the yuan is one of the most used currencies in trade finance worldwide, while many mainland banks and companies have used Hong Kong as a stepping stone to raise funds to develop their businesses internationally,\u201d Chan said.<\/p>\n

As Beijing kicks off its next five-year plan this year and refloats President Xi Jinping\u2019s goal of building the country into a \u201cfinancial superpower\u201d, analysts said Hong Kong could play a critical and unique role \u2013 and not just in solidifying the status of the offshore yuan. Long established as a global financial centre thanks to its common-law system, strong financial infrastructure and abundant talent, the city was also poised to help ramp up digital yuan adoption, connect global investors with mainland listing candidates and serve as a testing ground for cryptocurrency assets, they said.<\/p>\n

First declared at a high-level financial policy conference in 2023, Xi elaborated further on his vision of China as a financial superpower in a 2024 speech. Those remarks were recently republished by Qiushi, the ruling Communist Party\u2019s leading theoretical journal, indicating the ambitious target has not been forgotten in the run-up to this year\u2019s \u201ctwo sessions\u201d, the annual meetings of the country\u2019s top legislature and political advisory body.<\/p>\n

\u201cHong Kong can contribute to the country\u2019s ambition to be a financial superpower by being the best international financial centre that we can be,\u201d said Robert Lee Wai-wang, \u00ada lawmaker and the chairman of Hong Kong-based Grand Finance Group.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Wilson Chan Fung-cheung joined Hong Kong\u2019s banking industry as a foreign-exchange trader more than four decades ago,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":308593,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[14708,114,1657,9843,151696,184,3468,3448,25059,3470,154924,85,46,9734,154925,17460,145717,18544,154926],"class_list":{"0":"post-308592","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-bank-of-england","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-china","11":"tag-citigroup","12":"tag-deloitte-china","13":"tag-economy","14":"tag-goldman-sachs","15":"tag-hong-kong","16":"tag-hong-kong-monetary-authority","17":"tag-hsbc","18":"tag-huatai-securities","19":"tag-il","20":"tag-israel","21":"tag-jpmorgan","22":"tag-natixis-corporate-and-investment-banking","23":"tag-peoples-bank-of-china","24":"tag-project-mbridge","25":"tag-qiushi","26":"tag-securities-and-futures-commission"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308592","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=308592"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308592\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/308593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=308592"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=308592"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=308592"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}