2025 Financial Street Forum: China's financial openness in action

Editor's note: Lin G. is a CGTN economic commentator. The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of CGTN.

When China's Vice Premier He Lifeng called for "steady steps toward higher-level opening-up in the financial sector" at the 2025 Financial Street Forum, the timing was particularly significant: On the eve of the 15th Five-Year Plan, his remarks laid out a forward-looking commitment that will guide China's financial opening and global engagement for the years ahead.

At this Beijing-based forum, often regarded as China's equivalent of Wall Street gatherings, the event not only reflected a clear strategic signal from the vice premier, but also highlighted the launch of operational measures. These developments suggest a broader trend: China's financial openness is evolving beyond removing restrictions, moving toward actively offering greater convenience and embedding preferential treatment for foreign investors.

Investing in China: The Qualified Foreign Investor framework moves from gatekeeping to facilitation

China's financial openness has often been judged by the ease with which foreign capital can access its markets. The newly announced Optimization Plan for the Qualified Foreign Investor (QFI) regime signals a deeper, more practical institutional commitment. In the past few years, geopolitical tensions and uncertainties in the U.S.-China relations had restrained some foreign investors' willingness to engage deeply with Chinese markets. The QFI reforms aim to reverse this trend, sending a clear message: China welcomes long-term, allocation-oriented investors to participate substantively in its economic growth.

The QFI framework has evolved from a gatekeeping mechanism into a genuinely facilitative system. Approval procedures have been streamlined, investment scopes broadened, and dedicated "green channels" now ensure priority treatment for long-term, strategic investors. The details of the measures reveal that they are concrete, operational, and aimed at providing predictable and secure channels for engagement.

For foreign investors, the implications are significant. Access to China's markets is not just about seeking returns — it also offers diversification benefits, portfolio resilience, and exposure to the structural growth of the world's second-largest economy. Recently, China's A-shares and Hong Kong-listed equities are gaining renewed valuation appeal amid global asset rebalancing. In this context, as investors reassess risks and reallocate assets globally, the stability offered by China is likely to become an increasingly important consideration.

Trade payment systems: Addressing the Dollar–RMB dilemma for multinationals

If the optimization of the Qualified Foreign Investor framework represents connectivity through capital markets, China's State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) is advancing it through cross-border transaction systems. At the forum, Zhu Hexin, deputy governor of the People's Bank of China and head of SAFE, announced nine new measures aimed at deepening trade facilitation and innovating cross-border transaction management.

The policies cover expanding trade opening-up pilots, extending netting-settlement options, and relaxing service trade management rules. Particularly notable is the introduction of integrated RMB and foreign currency cash pools for multinational corporations, a mechanism that allows firms to manage China-based and global liquidity under a single regulatory framework.

The significance of these reforms extends beyond technical convenience. In a world where trade tensions and geopolitical frictions — such as US-led trade disputes — create uncertainty for many export-dependent economies, China's measures facilitating cross-border transactions offer a stable and reliable alternative for conducting international trade. The integrated cash pools, in particular, help companies navigate the dilemma of whether to settle in traditional foreign currencies, such as the US dollar, or in Chinese yuan, providing greater flexibility in managing liquidity.

This framework not only facilitates trade and investment but also signals China's intent to be a dependable anchor in global finance. The rapid growth of China's foreign exchange market — with turnover up 37 percent since 2020 and cross-border receipts and payments up 64 percent — underscores the increasing role of China in global trade finance.

Future vision: Toward better global financial governance

In his remarks, Vice Premier He Lifeng emphasized that China is ready to work with all parties to actively participate in studies on global financial governance, steadily advance reforms in the international financial system, and contribute Chinese wisdom and strength to maintaining a fair and equitable international economic and financial order while promoting global financial stability.

This statement situates China's financial evolution within a broader strategic horizon — signaling not just participation in the global system, but a gradual shift toward co-designing its institutional architecture.

This ambition is already taking shape. The 2025 Financial Street Forum demonstrated both high-level strategic guidance and the concrete implementation of specific measures, highlighting the forum's significance as a marker of China's advancing financial openness.