The People's Bank of China (PBOC), the country's central bank, highlighted measures for further opening China's financial markets in an article published on Sunday, including supporting stocks connect programs and optimizing investment environment.

The PBOC aims to promote smoother connections between China's financial markets and global markets. The central bank will continue to support the Bond Connect and Swap Connect programs, which allow overseas investors to access China's bond market and financial derivatives market.

As of January, a total of 1,129 overseas investors from over 70 countries and regions held 3.9 trillion yuan ($550 billion) in Chinese bonds.

The PBOC will work to align China's bond market rules and regulations with international standards in areas like issuance, registration, rating, and taxation. This is set to improve investment convenience for overseas institutions.

Chinese bonds are now included in the three major international bond indexes: Bloomberg Barclays, JPMorgan Chase, and FTSE Russell. 

Overseas investors have net bought Chinese bonds for 12 consecutive months, with the cumulative net purchase exceeding 1.8 trillion yuan as of January.

The PBOC will improve the management system for panda bond issuance. By January, overseas institutions had issued about 796 billion yuan of panda bonds in China's market. The PBOC will also coordinate further bond market opening and implement a package of measures to facilitate investment.