Budapest Renminbi Initiative Conference 2021

The Magyar Nemzeti Bank (MNB) launched the Budapest Renminbi Initiative Conference at the end of March 2015 in connection with the central bank’s Renminbi Program to strengthen ties between PBoC and MNB. The aim of the Budapest Renminbi Initiative is to take advantage of the growing international weight of the renminbi, to strengthen Budapest’s regional role in the Chinese-Central European economic relationship and to strengthen Chinese-Hungarian foreign economic relations. An important goal of the MNB with the initiative is to broaden the range of investment and financing sources in Hungary and to promote the growth of cross-border economic activity.

The Budapest Renminbi Initiative Conference, to be held for the sixth time on 16 September 2021 in Budapest online, intends to contribute to these goals through the development of Chinese-Hungarian economic diplomatic relations and international knowledge sharing.

 THE CONFERENCE WILL BE LIVE-STREAMED ON YOUTUBE AND ZOOM ON 16th SEPTEMBER 2021

Follow the event via Zoom here. 

The title of this year event will be “Central Banks’ vaccine against COVID-19 and the role of China and the RMB in the post-pandemic era”. After a high-level opening ceremony Lead speeches and panel discussions will be organized into two main topics:

1. China’s way of crisis management - How does the RMB support the restart of the world economy? What will be the role of the RMB in the post-Covid world economy and in the reshaping international financial system?
2. What could be the money of the future? What could the future of money be like? – Central bank digital currency and e-CNY as the next step in the evolution of the monetary system?

Budapest Renminbi Initiative 2021 conference

“Central Banks’ vaccine against COVID-19 and the role of China and the RMB in the post-pandemic era”

16 September 2021 (Thursday)

Preliminary program

09:00-09:30 High-level opening ceremony 

• Mr. Mihály Patai, Deputy Governor, Magyar Nemzeti Bank (MNB)
• Mr. Péter Szijjártó, Minister, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade
• Mr. Dayu Qi, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary, Embassy of the People's Republic of China in Hungary

09:30-10:30 Panel 1.: China’s way of crisis management - How does the RMB support the restart of the world economy? What will be the role of the RMB in the post-Covid world economy and in the reshaping international financial system?

• The first section examines how the People’s Bank of China has used various instruments to help maintain the stability of domestic and international renminbi markets and to improve the position of market participants involved in renminbi financing.
• In connection with this, we discuss how the importance and utilization of bilateral renminbi swap agreements have changed and what were the dominant trends in the development of the renminbi ratio within the central bank’s foreign exchange reserves during the crisis.
• In addition to crisis management, we would also like to look at how renminbi sources and multilateral institutions can support post-covid economic recovery in different parts of the world, especially in Central and Eastern Europe. We will also discuss the role that renminbi resources can play in financing the transition to a green and long-term sustainable economy.

Lead speaker

• Ms. Mei Jin, Chief Representative of PBOC, Representative Office for Europe

Panel discussion

Moderator:

• Mr. Ádám Banai, Executive Director, MNB

Discussants:

• Mr. Zoltán Kurali, CEO, Government Debt Management Agency
• Mr. Domenico Nardelli, Head of Treasury Department, Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank
• Dr. Hong Zhong, Deputy General Manager, Research Institute, Bank of China Head Office

10:30-10:40 Coffee break

10:40-11:40 Panel 2.: What could be the money of the future? What could the future of money be like? – Central bank digital currency and e-CNY as the next step in the evolution of the monetary system?

• Digital economy and the digital payments require digital money, which needs to have a central control and oversight, so that the resilient money supply as well as the monetary sovereignty of the issuing country to be guaranteed. The second section looks at how the money of the future could work in the era of digitalisation.
• This yet unchartered territory of central bank digital currencies offers a lot of opportunities but risks as well. Up until now the PBoC’s Digital Currency Institute has the most comprehensive vision and actual action plan how to smoothly introduce a CBDC into the already extensively digital retail payment market in China.
• What additional benefits the e-CNY can offer compared to commercial bank money? How commercial banks can still make business out of it? What use cases do exist for the wholesale market where CBDC can resolve market frictions? When multiple CBDC forms can really be interconnected so that international trade and finance can benefit from them? Can e-CNY be a role model for latecomers in designing a fully operational CBDC framework? Can the technology behind an existing CBDC framework replaced with a more advanced one once the reliability of currently researched technologies becomes underlined? How a solid CBDC system can be protected from ever-advancing cyber-attacks?

Lead speaker

• Mr. Changchun Mu, Director General of the Institute of Digital Currency, PBOC

Panel discussion

Moderator:

• Ms. Anikó Szombati, Executive Director, Chief Digital Officer, MNB

Discussants:

• Mr. Lian Cheng, Deputy Director of the Research Center for Payments and Settlements and Research Fellow/Professor at Institute of Finance & Banking, CASS
• Mrs. Yanyun Wang, General Manager, China Construction Bank (Europe), Hungary Branch
• Mr. Binur Zhalenov, Chairman, Payments and FinTech R&D Centre, National Bank of Kazakhstan

11:40 Closing remarks

• Mr. Mihály Patai, Deputy Governor, MNB