Speaker:

Prof Li Chen
Associate Professor and Associate Director
The Centre for China Studies
The Chinese University of Hong Kong

Date & Time:

Monday, 24 February 2025
3:30 pm – 5:00 pm (Singapore Time)

Registration:

Please register at https://nus-sg.zoom.us/meeting/register/JKZlzT4tQ5Km-FOSwYSTGA and indicate if you are joining us in-person.

On-site venue:

EAI Conference Room
NUS Bukit Timah Campus, Tower Block #06-01,
469A Bukit Timah Road, Singapore 259770

Abstract:

Over the past decade, there has been a series of steady policy innovations in China’s financial sector, involving new or modified linkages between mainland China and the international markets. The Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) in southern China has served as a key interface to connect China with global financial markets. In particular, the launch of the Stock Connect in 2014 and the Bond Connect in 2017 represent major financial innovations that have created new architecture to enhance financial connectivity between China and the rest of the world through Hong Kong. This has taken place in response to evolving external geopolitical and geo-economic pressures ranging from strategic tensions with the United States to structural shifts in regulatory modes and the distribution of influence in global finance following the 2008 financial crisis. This talk explores the recent financial connectivity initiatives in the GBA in the context of China’s economic and financial statecraft. It further discusses the role of Hong Kong as an international financial centre in the changing geopolitical environment.

About the Speaker:

Prof Li Chen is Associate Professor and Associate Director at the Centre for China Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). He is also Research Fellow (by courtesy) at CUHK’s Lau Chor Tak Institute of Global Economics and Finance, Associate Professor (by courtesy) at CUHK’s School of Governance and Policy Science, and Non-resident Fellow at the Institute for International Affairs at CUHK (Shenzhen). He has researched, written and taught on a wide range of issues in China’s political economy, development strategy, public policy and business environment in the global context, such as China’s state-owned-enterprise reform, financial governance, government-business relations and industrial and regional development policies. He received his PhD and MPhil in Development Studies from the University of Cambridge and dual bachelor’s degrees of Law (International Political Economy) and Economics from Peking University.