Standard Bank offers Africa yuan bank accounts

JOHANNESBURG – South Africa’s Standard Bank is offering clients across the continent yuan bank accounts for trade with China, a sign of the Chinese currency’s emergence as a global commercial currency.

‘Trade with China and Africa has seen massive growth in the last decade and Standard Bank, with its African roots, is uniquely placed to assist in the two-way trade flows between China and Africa,’ its China chief executive, Craig Bond, said.The ability to transact in yuan applies to all of the 17 countries where Standard Bank, the continent’s largest bank by assets, has a presence and reduces companies’ exposure to fluctuations in the value of the dollar, the company added.Africa’s trade with China has doubled every three years since 2000 and hit US$107 billion in 2008, eclipsing the United States for the first time as the continent’s biggest trading partner.Standard Bank said its new yuan accounts were made possible by its alliance with Industrial Commercial Bank of China, which bought a 20 percent stake in the Johannesburg-based lender in 2008. – Nampa-Reuters

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