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Financial and Monetary Affairs
January. At these meetings, FDRC Case Officers meet individual members of the public to explain the case intake criteria, mediation and arbitration processes, and answer questions.
Hong Kong as China's Global Financial Centre - Financial Co-operation with the Mainland
Capital Formation Centre and Global Investment Platform for the Mainland
Hong Kong's fundamental strengths make it an ideal provider to Mainland enterprises of top class investment banking services for mergers and acquisitions as well as consultancy on restructuring. The growing presence of Mainland companies listed on the SEHK in turn has increased the breadth and depth of Hong Kong's securities and futures markets through a greater diversity of constituent stocks in the equity market and a wider range of products. Mainland enterprises also raise capital in Hong Kong through the issuance of bonds, project financing and loan syndication.
Development of Offshore RMB Business
In 2013, the offshore RMB business in Hong Kong gained further momentum. Banks in Hong Kong handled RMB trade settlement of RMB3,841 billion in 2013, representing a 46 per cent growth as compared to 2012. Hong Kong's RMB liquidity pool has expanded steadily. At the end of 2013, the RMB customer deposits and outstanding RMB certificates of deposit issued amounted to RMB860 billion and RMB193 billion respectively, totalling RMB1,053 billion, up 46 per cent compared with RMB720 billion at the end of 2012.
Meanwhile, RMB financing activities remained buoyant. There was a significant growth in RMB bank lending, with the outstanding amount of RMB loans increasing to RMB116 billion at the end of 2013, from RMB79 billion at the end of 2012. RMB bond issuance in Hong Kong (or so- called 'dim sum bond') totalled RMB117 billion in 2013 and outstanding RMB bonds amounted to RMB310 billion at the end of 2013, up more than 30 per cent from the end of 2012. In 2013, the Central People's Government issued sovereign bonds twice with total size of RMB23 billion and regularised the issuance programme. Retail investors in Hong Kong were able to subscribe for sovereign bonds for the first time through participants of HKEx's Central Clearing and Settlement System (or CCASS). In June the CNH Hong Kong Interbank Offered Rate fixing (CNH) HIBOR fixing) was launched, providing a reliable benchmark for the pricing of loan facilities and helping the development of the RMB financing market.
Hong Kong is also the world's largest offshore RMB investment product market. A wide range of RMB products (including investment funds (both listed and unlisted), insurance products, currency futures, real estate investment trusts, shares and derivative products) are available in the market. The Renminbi Qualified Foreign Institutional Investors (RQFII) scheme was expanded further in March, allowing financial institutions which are registered and have major operations in Hong Kong to apply for RQFII status and relaxing the investment restriction of RQFII funds, thereby enriching the types of RMB products. Qualified institutions continued to show interest in developing RQFII products in Hong Kong. With the expansion of the RQFII scheme, the number of RQFII fund management companies managing SFC-authorised RQFII funds increased from 19 at the end of 2012 to 24 at the end of 2013. In August, the first RQFII A-share exchange-traded fund (ETF) tracking an index from China Exchanges Services Company
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