Global finance CEOs make first post-COVID visits to China

By Selena Li and Kane Wu

HONG KONG/SHANGHAI (Reuters) – A flurry of top financial executives have visited China for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic as global financial giants seek to cement their relations with Beijing at the start of President Xi Jinping’s new term.

Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon, HSBC CEO Noel Quinn and Standard Chartered boss Bill Winters are among the executives to have held face-to-face meetings with Chinese officials and regulators since last weekend.

Wall Street and European financial firms have in recent years stepped up their expansion efforts in China, seeking to boost their presence in the world’s second largest economy via new set ups and joint venture partnerships.

China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) head Yi Huiman met senior executives from international financial institutions including Bridgewater Associates, HSBC and Goldman Sachs in Beijing recently, the watchdog said on Friday in a statement.

International financial institutions and investors are welcome to expand in China, the chairman of the country’s securities regulator said.

Goldman Sachs’ Solomon and Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman met Peng Chun, chairman of China Investment Corporation (CIC), this week, according to official social media posts from the $1.35 trillion sovereign wealth fund.

Solomon and Peng “exchanged their views on international markets, China’s economic potential and cooperations in multiple areas”, and vowed to work with each other, the posts said.

HSBC’s Quinn and Standard Chartered’s Winters both attended China Development Forum 2023 in Beijing last weekend and met China’s banking regulator head Guo Shuqing.

Meanwhile, Chip Kaye, Warburg Pincus’s CEO, met Beijing’s major Yin Yong during his visit to the city last week, according to a municipal statement from Beijing.

Senior executives from Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund Temasek, Canada’s insurance group Manulife and Japanese Daiwa Securities also held meetings with CSRC’s Yi.

(Reporting by Selena Li and Kane Wu in Hong Kong, Jason Xue in Shanghai; Editing by David Goodman and Mark Potter)