While acknowledging the role of the microfinance as an important tool for ensuring development opportunities to small businesses that otherwise may never access financial resources, one should keep in mind that microfinance is sound if it is provided by sound institutions. There is not much benefit if such institutions fail because of lenience of their internal rules and procedures, and/or because the supervisory authority has closed an eye on them because of their social role. This will also make other institutions become hesitant in engaging in microfinance. The relationship between the microfinance institutions and the banking sector regarding their interaction in the economy financing, is a delicate issue. Their coexistence is certainly “peaceful” at the early development stage of at least one of these groups of institutions, but as the economy grows and competition increases, they tend to move toward each-other. At that stage, it is important to pay special attention for ensuring clear “rules of the game” for their activity and to provide adequate policies that allow for structural reforms of these institutions and of their market influence. In conclusion, microfinance is a very important mean to achieve a balanced economic growth, by providing financial support to small and medium businesses which are vital for the medium and long term economic growth. Compared to some other countries in the region, microfinance in Albania have shown higher growth rates with good quality. However, there is ample room for enhancing it further.

Indeed, trade invoicing in renminbi has already begun to spread beyond predominantly Chinese enterprises to multinational companies (MNCs) turning to China as a key market for their products and services. Notably, despite the initial difficulties in operationalising the renminbi-based system, some MNCs have successfully upgraded their global invoicing and payment systems to settle trade and working capital in renminbi with their Chinese counterparts. This allows for significant cost-savings on foreign exchange transactions in  2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  addition to efficiency gains from matching trade receipts to funding working capital requirements. The increased use of the renminbi for their investment activities in China is supported by the flexibility provided in China for movements of global funds in and out of the country. The potential longer-term benefits from using the renminbi-based system for their trade, working capital requirements and FDI in China is thus seen to clearly outweigh the implementation costs. In the more recent decade, financial investments have also gathered momentum as foreign investors commenced investment activities in Chinese financial markets since 2003 through the Qualified Foreign Institutional Investor (QFII) program. Wide-ranging measures, including the introduction of China Interbank Bond Market (CIBM) foreign quota in 2009, the Renminbi Qualified Foreign Institutional Investor (RQFII) in 2011 and the operationalisation of the Hong Kong-Shanghai Stock Connect in 2014, are all aimed at encouraging greater participation of foreign investors in China’s mainland financial markets.