China set to further advance financial opening-up

SHANGHAI/BEIJING – China will further advance the opening-up of its financial sector and capital markets, with Shanghai spearheading the efforts, a move that will bring fresh opportunities for collaboration in an increasingly fragmented international financial system, officials and experts said.

At the 2025 Lu­jiazui Forum held in Shanghai, China’s top financial regulators unveiled a raft of new opening-up measures on Wednesday, including setting up an international operation center for the digital yuan, or e-CNY, widening foreign institutions’ access to financial business pilot programs and improving the qualified foreign institutional investor, or QFII, program to facilitate overseas investment.

“We are committed to aligning China’s financial regulations with high-standard internatio­nal economic and trade agreements, exploring broader and deeper areas of opening-up,” said Li Yunze, head of the National Financial Regulatory Administration.

Li said that China will leverage successful practices from free trade zones and ports, supporting the greater participation of foreign institutions in financial business pilot programs.

Wu Qing, chairman of the China Securities Regulatory Commission, said the country will soon optimize the QFII program — which facilitates overseas institutions’ investments in financial markets — by easing entry requirements and facilitating investment operations. The number of futures and options products available to QFIIs will increase to 100 at an early date.

The CSRC announced later on Wednesday that starting on Oct 9, QFIIs will be allowed to engage in the trading of exchange-traded fund options listed on trading venues for hedging purposes.

With regulators swiftly turning pledges into action, Yang Haiping, a researcher at the Shanghai-based SIFL Institute, said that China is demonstrating its commitment to advancing high-standard institutional opening-up at a deeper level, injecting positive momentum into an increasingly uncertain global environment.

“The moves signal a shift in China’s high-level institutional financial opening-up — from passively adapting to existing international rules to proactively exploring new practices for high-level openness,” Yang said.

Pan Gongsheng, governor of the People’s Bank of China, the country’s central bank, announced at the forum an innovative measure for establishing an international operation center in Shanghai for the e-CNY, aimed at advancing the international use of the digital yuan and serving innovation in digital finance.

Lou Feipeng, a researcher at the Postal Savings Bank of China, said the center will create more application scenarios for the e-CNY and improve cross-border payment services, helping the renminbi play a greater role in enhancing the international payment system.

Pan also announced another measure conducive to renminbi internationalization — the development of offshore bonds in Shanghai’s free trade zone. The initiative aims to broaden financing channels for Chinese companies expanding globally and for high-quality enterprises participating in the Belt and Road Initiative. Analysts said the move can help position Shanghai as a key hub in the offshore renminbi market.

Christopher Hayward, chairman of the policy and resources committee of the City of London Corporation, said that China’s greater openness will benefit both the country and the United Kingdom.

“The more that China can open up, the better that will be for the Chinese economy,” Hayward said on the sidelines of the forum. “China has a great future — one which the UK wants to do business with.”

Official data shows the foreign insurers’ market share has more than doubled in China, from 4 percent in 2013 to 9 percent now, while foreign banks currently account for nearly 20 percent of China’s derivatives market, demonstrating the country’s openness to global financial institutions.