Xi Jinping Calls for Renminbi to Become Global Reserve Currency

Femi Ashekun/

Chinese President, Xi Jinping, has called for the renminbi to evolve into a global reserve currency in his clearest articulation yet of Beijing’s ambitions to elevate China’s currency within the international monetary system.

Writing in Qiushi, the Chinese Communist Party’s flagship ideology journal, Xi said China must build a “powerful currency” that is widely used in international trade, investment and foreign exchange markets, and capable of attaining reserve currency status.

The comments were published this week but were originally delivered in a speech to senior regional officials in 2024.

According to the Financial Times, while China has long promoted the internationalisation of the renminbi, Xi’s remarks go further than previous statements by explicitly linking currency strength to global reserve status and to broader reforms in China’s financial system.

Xi said achieving this goal would require a powerful central bank with effective monetary management, globally competitive financial institutions, and international financial centres capable of attracting global capital and influencing global pricing.

The publication of the comments comes at a time of growing uncertainty in global financial markets, as a weaker US dollar, leadership changes at the US Federal Reserve, and rising geopolitical and trade tensions prompt central banks to reassess their exposure to dollar-denominated assets.

US President, Donald Trump, last week described the dollar’s recent weakness as a “great” development.

“China senses the change of the global order more real than before,” Kelvin Lam, senior China economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, told the Financial Times.

He said Xi’s emphasis on the renminbi reflected “recent ruptures in the global order”.

China’s central bank governor, Pan Gongsheng, last year predicted the emergence of a more multipolar international monetary system, saying the renminbi would increasingly compete with other major currencies.

Analysts quoted by the Financial Times said Beijing does not expect the yuan to replace the dollar rapidly, but rather to act as a strategic counterweight that reduces US financial leverage.

The renminbi has gained traction in trade finance since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, becoming the world’s second-largest trade finance currency. However, its role in official reserves remains limited.

International Monetary Fund data cited by the Financial Times show that as of the third quarter of 2025, the US dollar accounted for about 57 percent of global reserves, the euro around 20 percent, while the renminbi ranked sixth at 1.93 percent.

Economists said broader adoption of the renminbi would require capital account liberalisation and full convertibility, conditions Beijing has so far approached cautiously.

Trading partners have also urged China to allow a stronger currency, arguing the renminbi remains undervalued and has contributed to a record $1.2 trillion trade surplus last year.

IMF managing director, Kristalina Georgieva, previously called on China to address economic imbalances, including deflation that has led to what she described as “significant real exchange rate depreciation”.

Chinese officials have denied using a weaker currency to gain trade advantages.

People’s Bank of China vice-governor, Zou Lan, said last month that Beijing had no intention of deliberately devaluing the renminbi, while policymakers have signalled tolerance for mild appreciation against a weakening dollar, even as the currency continues to slide against the euro.

“Xi’s rhetoric won’t flip global foreign exchange markets today, but it reinforces a long-term shift investors are already watching,” Han Shen Lin, China country director at The Asia Group, told the Financial Times. “Beijing senses that the dollar’s dominance is no longer unquestioned and is steadily pushing its currency forward.”