RMB settlement of cross-border trade broaden to the whole nation

The Central Bank revealed on Aug. 23, Circular on Broaden RMB settlement of Cross-Border Trade to the Whole Nation, jointly released by Central Bank, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Commerce, General Administrations of Customs, State Administration of Taxation and Banking Regulatory Commission, clearly defined that enterprises from Hebei, Shanxi, Anhui, Jiangxi, Henan, Hunan, Guizhou, Shanxi, Gansu, Qinghai and Ningxia are now allowed to make RMB settlement on cross-border trade; the territorial scope of RMB settlement for Jilin, Heilongjiang, Tibet and Xinjiang now expends from only neighboring countries to all the foreign countries.

July 2009, the Central Bank started pilot project of RMB settlement on cross-border trade, and from June 2010, expended the model regions to 20 provinces (city, autonomous region) including Beijing. Since then this business has been running fine, the business demands of RMB settlement from both enterprises and banks are ever increasing. The first half of 2011, the accumulated business amount of RMB settlement on cross-border trade was 957.57 billion yuan, 13.3 times more than the previous year. According to the practice, Hongkong was the main source of RMB settlement on cross-border trade. In the year 2010, the total business amount of RMB settlement in Hongkong was 369.2 billion yuan, accounted for 73 percent of the total amount of China.