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Free trade zone (FTZ) bonds were supposed to be foreign investors’ fast lane into Chinese fixed income. But with only one bond sold since the market’s launch last year and the rapid opening of the onshore bond market, there are doubts over whether international investors need FTZ bonds at all.
The Hong Kong Exchange has published a report on the benefits of a Primary Equity Connect linking China and Hong Kong. But market participants are divided over the risks and benefits of this new scheme, our sister publication GlobalCapital Asia reports.
Volkswagen Finance (China) is hitting the road in China’s securitization for the second time this year. The originator is set to raise Rmb3.66bn ($554m) on September 6.
Two red chips companies are coming to the Panda bond market for the first time. Energy company Brightoil has hired JP Morgan’s former joint venture in China to underwrite its Rmb5bn offering, and real estate issuer Joy City has picked China Citic Bank to handle its Rmb10bn deal.
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has proposed the creation of national green financing vehicles to boost environmentally friendly and financially sustainable infrastructure investments, our sister publication GlobalCapital Asia reports.
Regulators:
The politburo of the Communist Party of China has announced that the 19th Communist Party congress will open on October 18, Xinhua reported on Thursday. The congress takes place once every five years.
The China Securities Regulatory Commission appointed Zhang Shenfeng as assistant chairman on August 30. Before taking the job, Zhang was the chief executive at China Financial Futures Exchange.
Bonds:
The government of Sharjah, one of seven members of the United Arab Emirates, is planning to issue a Panda bond, according to an August 31 media report. The deal would be the first offering by a Middle Eastern issuer in China’s interbank bond market, said the report.
RMBi :
The renminbi once again entered the world’s top five of most active payment currencies in July, according to SWIFT data’s RMB tracker. The Chinese currency made up 2% of all payments, up 1.98% from June. Meanwhile, RMB payments’ value was down 3.71% in the same period, compared to an average decrease of 4.34% among all payment currencies. The dollar, Euro, pound and yen are ahead of the RMB with shares of 39.83%, 33.34%, 7.31% and 3.15%, respectively. The Canadian dollar now trails the Chinese currency with a 1.85% share.
SWIFT data also shows that Hong Kong remains the most active offshore RMB market in July, settling 76.66% of all RMB payments outside China, followed with the UK with 5.02% and Singapore, with 4.21%.
Indices:
FTSE Russell has added China Vanke, a real estate developer, to its FTSE China A50 Index, which represents the 50 largest A-Share companies in China, the index provider said on August 30.
FTSE also added Geely Automobile Holdings to its FTSE China 50 Index, a tradable index which captures the largest Chinese stocks listed in Hong Kong.
Hubs:
RMB deposits in Hong Kong grew by 1.6% to Rmb534.7bn, according to the Hong Kong Monetary Authority. Meanwhile, total remittance of RMB for cross-border trade settlement went down from Rmb329.6bn from Rmb372.5bn in the same period.
Singapore's RMB deposits went up 8.7% in the second quarter of 2017 to Rmb138bn, according to data by the Monetary Authority of Singapore. Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Singapore branch, the official clearing bank in the country, also said on August 29 that, as of July, it had cleared RMB transactions worth Rmb170tr.
The New York branch of China Merchants Bank has been approved by China Foreign Exchange Trade System as a foreign currency lending member in the onshore FX market effective September 12.
FX:
The PBoC’s renminbi fix against the dollar was set at 6.5909 this morning, 101bp stronger from Thursday. The NEX CNH benchmark came in at 6.6024 at 4.31pm on Thursday, weaker from 6.5930 on Wednesday.
The dollar index closed at 92.667 on Thursday, down 0.2% from Wednesday, according to Bloomberg. The Thomson Reuters CNY reference index closed at 95.56 on Thursday, up 0.04% from its previous close.
The trade-weighted index by CFETS closed on 31 August at 94.38, up 1.76% in the month, while the BIS basket and special drawing rights basket indices finished the month at 95.12 and 95.29, gaining 1.61% and 1.64%, respectively, according to CFETS.