The State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) has recently released the data on purchases and sales of foreign exchange by banks and the cross-border receipts and payments by non-banking sectors for April 2026. SAFE Deputy Administrator and Press Spokesperson Li Bin answered media questions on foreign exchange market situation for April 2026.
Q: The external environment has witnessed rapid changes recently. Could you brief us on China's foreign exchange market operation?
A: Geopolitical developments have triggered fluctuations in global financial markets recently, yet China's foreign exchange market has maintained generally sound performance. Affected by external disruptions, cross-border capital posted certain net outflows in March before returning to net inflows in April. Combining the readings of March and April, the amount of average monthly net inflow of cross-border capital stood at USD 14.9 billion, and the amount of average monthly net purchases of foreign exchange by banks reached USD 28 billion, both lower than the monthly surplus recorded at the end of last year and early this year. Cross-border transactions remained active. The cross-border receipts and payments by enterprises, individuals and other non-banking sectors totaled USD 1.6 trillion in April, representing a year-on-year increase of 15%. The foreign exchange market recorded total transactions of USD 3.7 trillion, staying at a relatively high level.
Enterprises steadily strengthened their capacity for exchange rate risk management and foreign exchange transactions were conducted in a more rational manner. In the first four months of this year, the scale of corporate forex derivative transactions rose by 22% year-on-year, and the foreign exchange hedging ratio stood at 33.6%, up 3.7 percentage points from 2025. Awareness of enterprises on exchange rate risk management improved, which helped drive them to conduct foreign exchange transactions more rationally. Enterprises' willingness to settle foreign exchange edged down moderately in April, and the foreign exchange purchase ratio declined month on month, signaling that market expectations remained basically stable.
