Zhou Liang, Deputy Director of China’s National Financial Regulatory Administration, said that Hong Kong handles over 75% of the world’s offshore RMB payment and settlement business. The authority will continue to deepen financial and capital market cooperation between China and Hong Kong, further broaden financial opening-up, and guard against cross-border financial risks.
According to reports from Hong Kong Commercial Daily and Radio Television Hong Kong, Zhou Liang stated at the 2025 International Financial Leaders’ Investment Summit on November 4th that China has achieved great accomplishments during the 14th Five-Year Plan period, and the development of the financial sectors in both China and Hong Kong forms an important part of these achievements.
Zhou Liang noted that the total assets of China’s banking and insurance sectors have exceeded 500 trillion RMB (294.79 trillion ringgit), with an average annual growth of 9% over the past five years. China’s status as the world’s largest credit market and the second-largest insurance market has become even more solid.
He mentioned that capital markets in China and Hong Kong have performed strongly, with trust, wealth management, insurance, and asset management institutions collectively administering assets of 100 trillion RMB (58.96 trillion ringgit). Among the world’s top 1,000 banks, 143 are Chinese-funded banks. Hong Kong-funded banks account for half of the asset scale among foreign banks in China. Various indicators remain at leading levels.
Zhou Liang stressed that the next step is to further deepen financial cooperation between China and Hong Kong, and to further consolidate and enhance Hong Kong’s status as an international financial center; to benchmark against high international standards in trade and commerce rules, and to explore financial opening-up in broader fields and on a larger scale.
He said that as policy dividends from the “Belt and Road” initiative and the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area continue to be released, financial cooperation between China and Hong Kong will inevitably see greater development potential. The authorities will proactively respond to the demands of the financial sectors in Hong Kong and Macao within the tax law framework, and continuously enhance China’s level of financial opening-up towards Hong Kong and Macao; make full use of Hong Kong’s role as a “super connector,” support Chinese insurance companies in issuing catastrophe bonds in Hong Kong, as well as support banking and insurance institutions to use Hong Kong as a base to provide comprehensive financial services for Chinese enterprises going global.