Financial risk the ‘critical battle’ for Xi Jinping in next three years

China’s leadership has made ­preventing financial risk an economic priority for the next three years as President Xi Jinping tries to steer the economy through perilous territory, with a ­mountain of debt and an ­increasingly hostile Washington.

That was one conclusion from a three-day closed-door meeting of hundreds of senior cadres that has wrapped up in Beijing – the first economic policymaking session since Xi tightened his grip on power at the party congress in October.

The leadership under Xi has decided that speed of growth is no longer an overriding concern as China now pursues “high quality” development instead, according to a statement from Xinhua.

While it was also decided at the annual conference that China will stick to its “proactive fiscal policy and prudent monetary policy” for 2018, it has set three-year targets to clean up the messy financial sector and the country’s polluted air.

China will “fight the critical battle of addressing major risks with the priority on managing and preventing financial risk” over the next three years, according to the statement carried by Xinhua.