Money Hub

来源 :Beijing Review | 被引量 : 0次 | 上传用户:cangyueshang
下载到本地 , 更方便阅读
声明 : 本文档内容版权归属内容提供方 , 如果您对本文有版权争议 , 可与客服联系进行内容授权或下架
论文部分内容阅读
Fang Xinghai, Director of the Shanghai Financial Service Office, is hard at work on one goal: By 2020 Shanghai will be an “international financial center in tandem with the national economic strength and the international status of the renminbi.”
The overall plan was announced by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) on January 30.
Early in 2009, the State Council decided to turn Shanghai into China’s international financial center. The transition period China has set to completely open its capital account ends in 2020. The NDRC hopes, via the plan, to make Shanghai a global financial hub before opening the capital account in 2020.
At the end of 2010 there were 1,049 financial institutions in Shanghai, including 21 Shanghai-headquartered foreign-invested banks, five joint venture securities companies, 22 joint venture asset management companies, eight foreign-invested property insurance companies and 11 joint venture life insurance companies.


The commission said the run-up to 2015 will be “a period of strategic opportunities”for the construction of the international financial center, and by 2015 Shanghai will become a global center of renminbi product innovation, trading, clearing and pricing.
Fang said Shanghai has formulated detailed plans, including accelerating im- provement of the financial market system, establishing a renminbi cross-border payment and clearance center and speeding up reform and innovation of the financial market.
Strategic opportunities
Now at an important strategic crossroad, Shanghai stands poised to become a hub for international financing.
The world economic and financial structure is accelerating adjustment as it recovers from the global financial crisis, and China’s status as a world power is improving. In the coming years, the tendency of multi-polarization and economic globalization will continue to deepen, the world economic structure will be further adjusted, and the role of emerging economies represented by China and India will be more significant. Emerging economies and developing countries will have more say in international financial affairs and global transnational financial transactions will be more in favor of emerging economies. These changes will offer better opportunities for Shanghai to accelerate its transformation into a global financial hub.
China’s rapid economic growth has been just the engine Shanghai needs as it rolls down the road to the global financial hub. China’s economic strength will continue to improve in the coming years. The country’s economic development will feature in accelerated restructuring and transformation of the development pattern, and a Shanghai-centered world-level city with strong international competitiveness will be formed.
In order to better adapt to its economic restructuring, transformation of the development pattern and improvement of international competitiveness, China will further accelerate reform and opening up in the financial sector. More progress will be made in construction of a multi-level financial market system and in the reform of market-oriented interest rate. Furthermore, the exchange rate formation mechanism will be steadily promoted, the proportion of direct financing will be greatly raised, and the role of the financial market in resource allocation will be remarkably enhanced.
As China’s economic strength improves and convertibility of the renminbi is increased, the demand for the renminbi as a clearance, investment and reserve currency by foreign traders will grow.
What Shanghai needs to do now, Fang said, is utilize favorable conditions to push forward the construction of an international financial center.
Present situation
According to the NDRC plan, Shanghai has been busy building itself into an international financial center by enhancing construction ss
of the financial market system and focusing on financial reform, opening up and financial innovation.
Shanghai’s financial market system has been continuously improved and the scale of financial market has been markedly increased, with the opening of the China Financial Futures Exchange and Shanghai Clearing House. The Shanghai inter-bank offered rate was successfully launched, and Shanghai has consolidated its status as a molding ground for the renminbi benchmark exchange rate and benchmark interest rate. Medium-term notes, gold futures, zinc futures and stock index futures, which are becoming more influential in Shanghai’s financial market, has greatly enhanced the trading and pricing function of the Shanghai financial market.
According to figures from the Shanghai Municipal Government, in the past five years the city’s financial market scale has grown. In 2010 the trading volume of Shanghai’s financial market (excluding foreign exchange market) stood at 386.2 trillion yuan ($61.4 trillion), up by 10 fold than that in 2005; and the volume of direct financing totaled 2.38 trillion yuan ($378.38 billion), up by 2.4 fold than that in 2005.
Statistics from Shanghai also showed that the ranking of Shanghai’s financial market is growing. In 2010 the trading volume of Shanghai’s stock exchange ranked third in the world, and the year-end stock value ranked sixth; the deposited bond balance at the National Inter-Bank Funding Center ranked fifth in the world; the number of contracts traded at the Shanghai Futures Exchange ranked second among global commodities and futures exchanges, making Shanghai one of the three pricing centers for non-ferrous metals; and the spot trading volume of gold at the Shanghai Gold Exchange ranked first.
Over the past five years, Shanghai became home to a number of financial institutions. As the number of commercial banks, securities companies, insurance companies, fund management companies and futures companies increased, various functional and innovative financial institutions have been set up, such as micro-lending companies, financing guarantee companies and equity investment companies.
The financial innovation capability of Shanghai has been greatly enhanced. Important innovated businesses such as the launch of renminbi settlement for crossborder transactions and the bonded delivery of futures have improved the city’s financial service capability. Strength of Shanghai’s financial institutions is improving. By the end of 2010, the aggregate assets of all financial institutions had reached 14 trillion yuan($2.23 trillion), up 1.9 fold from 2005.
To be improved
The NDRC said the unsound market mechanism, weak innovation capability and the current level of openness restricted the construction progress of Shanghai into a global financial hub.
The city still faces limited types and a number of institutional investors and a relatively small category of financial products and tools. Furthermore, it needs to improve the function of resource allocation of its financial market, enhance the international competitiveness and influence of its financial institutions, raise the internationalization level of the financial industry, and further improve its environment in the fields of the financial legal system, taxation, credit, supervision and human resource services.
These problems should be solved through accelerating the reform and opening up of the financial industry as soon as possible.
How far exactly is Shanghai from classification as a genuine international financial hub?
Yi Xianrong, a researcher at the Institute of Finance and Banking of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, thought as for talent, infrastructure and technologies, Shanghai is actually not far behind New York and Tokyo—the world’s two largest financing hubs. The gap now comes more so from the monetary policy.
According to Yi, to build Shanghai into an international financial center, three requirements need to be met: let the renminbi go abroad; let offshore renminbi be used for all businesses like other free convertible currencies; and let overseas institutions and individuals participate in and expand
trading in overseas renminbi markets.
Sun Lijian, Deputy Director of the School of Economics at Fudan University, said the NDRC plan does not incorporate the foreign exchange market, which unleashed a signal that the Central Government doesn’t have plans to open the exchange rate and renminbi free convertibility under capital account.
“Not considering discussions of tal- ents, infrastructure and technologies, just because of capital controls, Shanghai’s renminbi market is unlikely to become a major global financial hub before China fully opens free convertibility of the renminbi,”Sun said.
There is far more that Shanghai needs to accomplish to be a global financial hub. Major disadvantages in the minds of foreign investors with eyes on Shanghai include: Chinese law is quite conservative in allowable types of financial products to be traded, and many complicated financial products, especially financial derivatives, are prohibited within China, making it difficult for Shanghai to tap the potential in leading China’s derivative trading. In addition, global use of the renminbi is limited, and Shanghai’s service industry still cannot meet the demand of building an international financial center.
Major Measures
l Accelerate improving the financial market system by expanding the financial market in both breadth and depth.
l Attract financial institutions with international competitiveness and industrial influence and further improve the structure of financial institutions.
l Establish global renminbi payment and clearance networks in Shanghai and support the financial market to strengthen infrastructure construction.
l Deepen the financial reform, and establish a financial innovation mechanism.
l Enhance the capability of financial institutions to offer global services and accelerate renminbi settlement business for cross-border trade and investment.
l Strengthen the legal environment in Shanghai and formulate financial laws.
其他文献
Between April 22 and 27, China and Russia conducted joint naval exercises in the waters of the Yellow Sea off China’s east coast for the first time, signifying the growing cooperation under the ChinaR
期刊
Wang Dajia, a 16-year-old middle school student from Changsha, capital of central China’s Hunan Province, has supported charitable causes for nine years. After the catastrophic earthquake in Sichuan P
期刊
Titanic 3D, a retouched version of the 1997 Hollywood blockbuster, swept the Chinese box office by raking in 500 million yuan ($79 million) in the first week (April 10-16) of its release, according to
期刊
Running along a sheer cliff with steep drops on either side, the Jiankou section of the Great Wall is one of the most scenic and rugged sections of the 600-year-old defensive work in the vicinity of B
期刊
A toxic-cadmium spill in January left 3.7 million residents in Liuzhou City in south China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region struggling to find a secure supply of drinking water.Contamination was fir
期刊
In February, Niu Weiwei, a 19-yearold Chinese woman, was invited to Copenhagen in Denmark to experience Danish happiness and deliver the Chinese understanding of happiness to the country as well.  Niu
期刊
In China, as in most other parts of the world, marriage has traditionally been seen as one of the most significant events in a person’s life.  In the past, marriages were arranged by parents or other
期刊
The People’s Bank of China (PBC), the country’s central bank, seems to be loosening liquidity to stimulate economic growth.  According to the PBC, in March, newly increased renminbi loans reached 1.0
期刊
For most of the 130 million Chinese migrants who make the annual pilgrimage from the country’s urban centers to their rural hometowns or interior cities for China’s Spring Festival holiday, the storie
期刊
China’s economy is slowing, but remains a bright spot in an unpredictable global economy, said the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in its latest China Economic Outlook.The IMF expects China’s GDP to
期刊