Wall Street banks pile into dim-sum bonds, building a global yuan (opens the source in a new tab)
- Bloomberg columnist Andy Mukherjee notes that the world's biggest banks have sold nearly triple last year's total of offshore yuan (dim-sum) bonds in Hong Kong so far this year, led by Citigroup, Barclays and BNP Paribas.
- The draw is no longer currency arbitrage but China's vast pool of savers, short of returns at home, who can buy offshore through Southbound Bond Connect while staying in yuan.
- Beijing wants deep yuan markets to blunt Western sanctions. The irony, he says: as Washington frets, US megabanks help build them.
- 3rd
- Offshore yuan's rank as a bank funding currency
Why it matters Each dim-sum deal is a small step toward a yuan that trade partners can hold and earn on without touching the dollar. Currency power is being built through bond plumbing, not summit speeches.
Other side The yuan is still a sliver of global reserves, and capital controls set the ceiling: the 2016 liquidity squeeze showed Beijing can drain offshore yuan when it chooses. Banks borrowing cheap yuan may be opportunism, not a vote of confidence.