this is confirmed by the currency ’ s slight upward tendency. given the uncertainty surrounding economic developments, however, there is still palpable concern regarding a depreciation and renewed capital outflows, all the more as china is one of the last big economies that is continuing to loosen parts of its monetary policy. 4 the importance of the frankfurt financial centre for german - chinese cooperation. frankfurt has always been the mainstay of the good relations between our two countries. the deutsche bundesbank is not just an onlooker with regard to promoting german - chinese relations ; it also makes its own active contribution. one year ago, my predecessor carl - ludwig thiele announced at this very location a joint study by the bundesbank and the academy of internet finance of zhejiang university hangzhou, the sino - german center and professor bernd skiera of the goethe university in frankfurt, and supported by the deutsche gesellschaft fur internationale zusammenarbeit ( giz ) to examine consumers ’ payment behaviour in germany and china. the results have now been published. a number of parallels have been found to exist between our countries. in china, providers of innovative payment procedures such as alipay and wechat today play a dominant role in online trade and at points of sale, with market shares of up to 65 %. cash is still most commonly used in rural areas, however. innovative payment methods are increasingly gaining market shares in germany, too, although many consumers still do not see the advantages of the new technology or view it with distrust. for this reason, preference is still given to traditional payment methods. the study is one of numerous initiatives that have been launched to foster dialogue and promote mutual understanding. in this context, the sino - german center of finance and economics i just mentioned, which is a research centre run jointly by the goethe university in frankfurt and the renmin university in peking, acts as a platform for the exchange of independent ideas and organises regular workshops in frankfurt and peking, amongst other things. and interest in a close exchange of thoughts between china and germany is likely to grow still further in the years to come. 4 / 5 bis central bankers'speeches given the forthcoming brexit, frankfurt ’ s role as a major financial centre within the european union will grow more and more important. this means that, besides chinese business representatives, representatives from the fields of politics and academia will increasingly seek to exchange thoughts on matters of business and finance with frankfurt. moreover, current

sdr ). since then, it has occupied a place in this select group of currencies alongside the us dollar, the euro, the japanese yen and the pound sterling. with that, the renminbi took its first formal step on its way to becoming an international key currency. this was a step that crowned many years of political wooing and a process of cautiously opening up the chinese capital markets, as well as a variety of programmes to give foreign investors access to china ’ s capital markets. use of the renminbi as a reserve and investment currency was gradually increased as a result. the first milestone was reached in 2017, when bond connect, a joint venture of the china foreign exchange trade system ( cfets ) and hong kong exchanges and clearing limited, was set up. amongst other things, the idea behind bond connect is to make it easier for foreign investors to participate in trading in the chinese fixedincome market. close to 400 foreign investors have so far joined the interbank bond market via bond connect. in march of this year, daimler took advantage of the opening up of the chinese capital market to international issuers to become the first large german enterprise to issue a renminbi bond. over and above that, foreign financial corporations in particular have, for the most part, had quite a hard time in china to date. but china ’ s president and party leader, xi jinping, announced a new “ opening - up phase ” earlier this year. foreign enterprises are now permitted to take majority shares in chinese banks, brokers and insurers. moreover, non - residents will in future be able to hold up to 51 % of financial enterprises. this is an important step towards the further opening up of the capital markets, given that foreign investors were barred in the past from engaging in the chinese financial markets independently. the only role open to them was that of junior partner holding a share of no more than 49 %. although the markets ’ response to this new opening - up process has so far been muted, this constitutes major progress. what ’ s more, the chinese government has announced that it will completely remove the restrictions on participations in the coming years, thereby ending the requirement that foreign service providers enter into a joint venture with chinese companies. that said, international investors will undoubtedly have to continue to demonstrate patience in the near future. bond connect and the loosening of the joint venture requirement are just two further additions to a chain of measures designed to establish a modern