China's yuan currency emerging to reshape global trading patterns
The rise of China's economy and its push for internationalisation of its currency prompt companies to consider using it for payments
Veteran banker Evan Goldstein's phone has been ringing hot this year, thanks to his German corporate clients' increasing enthusiasm for the yuan.
The global head of yuan solutions at Deutsche Bank has perhaps the best vantage point on how trading patterns between the two largest economies in Asia and Europe are undergoing momentous change with Germany's embrace of the Chinese currency.
"The market has shifted significantly over the past three years," Goldstein said. "We are seeing more and more corporate treasurers getting serious about considering the [yuan] as a treasury centre currency."
Just as the bilateral trade pattern is being reshaped by the yuan, a broader pattern is becoming evident globally.
The rise of China's economy mirrors that of Britain in the late 1800s and the United States between the two world wars, when first the pound and then the US dollar became the dominant unit of account in the international commodity markets and the reserve currency.
Fast forward to the 21st century and China's major trading partners have been keen to support Beijing's quest for the internationalisation of the yuan.
The use of the yuan in Germany for payments has grown at the fastest pace in Europe, a report from payments company Swift for last month shows. The take-up in the continent's economic powerhouse has jumped 151 per cent since April last year.