Editor's note：Matteo Giovannini is a finance professional at the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China in Beijing and a member of the China Task Force at the Italian Ministry of Economic Development. The article reflects the author's views, and not necessarily those of CGTN.

Three years into the COVID-19 pandemic have not impacted China's determination to enhance a domestic financial sector that is soon expected to match the level of economic relevance on the global stage achieved by the country over the last four decades.

Two weeks after the conclusion of the Annual Conference of Financial Street Forum, that placed Beijing into the spotlight, it's China's commercial capital and most populous city to become the focus of nationwide attention.

The fourth edition of the Bund Summit, held on December 9-11 in Shanghai, has seen the participation of renowned finance and economics individuals gathering to discuss solutions to tackle the most pressing global economic challenges.

In an agenda rich of thought-provoking topics, ranging from geopolitical dynamics to macroeconomic factors and from supply chain issues to technological trends, the discussions over the development of Shanghai as an international financial center have caught the attention of a large part of the audience.

China holds great expectations for Shanghai with a vision to transform the city into an international financial hub, which was unveiled in 2009. By elevating the standing of the Pudong New Area to the same level of prominent financial centers such as New York's Manhattan and the city of London, China will arouse greater confidence in the domestic financial market from global investors.

Speakers at the Bund Summit have underlined how Shanghai has made tremendous efforts towards advancing its financial opening-up and expanding foreign investors' access to the domestic financial industry. 

The removal of additional barriers to market entry could make Shanghai a more finance-friendly city, as well as a catalyst of both capital inflows and specialized talents. A well-developed international financial center can benefit Shanghai and its surrounding territory, generating positive macroeconomic outcomes such as higher employment, more labor productivity, and better infrastructures.

A representative from the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission (CBIRC) has declared that its Shanghai office would support financial institutions based in the Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone while promoting more cooperation with the institutions present in other parts of the Yangtze River Delta region. There's going to be a higher degree of integration in a region, considered to be an economic powerhouse of modern China. It will boost prosperity for the country's future, characterized by high-quality growth.

Some observers think that Shanghai faces a disadvantage in its journey to become a world-class financial center because of domestic competition from Beijing, where financial policies are conceived and the headquarters of major financial institutions are located, and from Shenzhen, where innovations in digital finance are already present. This criticism is based on the fact that New York and London, unlike Shanghai, enjoy full support in terms of financial resource allocation and have their financial center situated in or in proximity of the country's capital.

On the contrary, it's believe that joining forces and combining industry-specific expertise with Beijing and Shenzhen will boost Shanghai's quest to emerge as a world-class financial center and, through a less circumscribed distribution of financial resources, help to support development of the whole country.

Shanghai can become a financial hub that would be more open to foreign capitals and well-integrated at the domestic level. The city can serve as a springboard for promoting the Chinese yuan as a more accepted legal tender in the international markets. This aspect is critical since the possibility for China to rely on its own currency for transactions with third parties contain geopolitical implications, such as a reduced exchange and political risk resulting from a lower exposure to the U.S. dollar.

The adherence to the national strategy, the constant opening-up to promote internationalization and the promotion of cross-border use of yuan to guarantee competitive advantage are all elements that demonstrate how Shanghai stands at the core of the country's vision of the future.

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