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Norman Chan pitches Hong Kong yuan services in Dubai

HKMA chief urges region's fund managers to take heed of mainland's currency expansion

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Monetary Authority chief executive Norman Chan Tak-lam and top Standard Chartered executives yesterday met more than 150 businesspeople in Dubai to pitch Hong Kong's yuan services.

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Although the yuan is not fully convertible, Beijing has since 2009 encouraged the use of the currency for trade settlements and investment services.

In the past two years, the HKMA has been holding similar roadshows in Britain, the United States and Australia to promote Hong Kong as the leading offshore yuan trading centre.

Chan said this would be the first time such a promotion had been attempted in the Middle East.

"Trade activities between the [United Arab Emirates] and China have grown more than 10 times over the past decade, from less than US$3 billion in 2001 to US$37 billion in 2011. China is the UAE's second-largest non-oil-trading partner and the second-largest source of the UAE's imports," he said.

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"The greater use of yuan in bilateral transactions will provide further impetus for trade and investment links between China and the Middle East to expand in the times ahead, which will be mutually beneficial."

Chan also said that as China was in the process of encouraging more international usage of the yuan, this would provide fund managers in the Middle East the opportunity to diversify their investment portfolio.

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