Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Xi Jinping has issued his clearest call yet for China’s currency to achieve global reserve status, signaling Beijing’s long-term ambition to weaken U.S. financial dominance and reshape the international monetary system.
In commentary published in Qiushi, the Chinese Communist Party’s flagship ideology journal, Xi said China must build a “powerful currency” that is “widely used in international trade, investment and foreign exchange markets, and attain reserve currency status.”
While China has spent years promoting wider use of the renminbi, Xi’s remarks mark his most explicit articulation to date of a strategy aimed at elevating the yuan into the top tier of global currencies.
The Chinese president argued that achieving reserve status would require sweeping financial reforms, including the creation of a “powerful central bank,” globally competitive financial institutions, and international financial centers capable of attracting global capital and influencing worldwide pricing.
The comments were originally delivered in a 2024 speech to senior regional officials but were not made public until this week.
Their release comes amid growing global uncertainty as the U.S. dollar weakens, leadership changes loom at the Federal Reserve, and geopolitical and trade tensions push central banks to reconsider their exposure to dollar-denominated assets.
However, President Donald Trump recently described the dollar as being in a “great” position.
Kelvin Lam of Pantheon Macroeconomics said:
“China senses the change of the global order more real than before.”
Lam noted that Xi’s remarks reflect what Beijing sees as fractures in the existing financial system.
China’s central bank governor, Pan Gongsheng, echoed that view last year.
The Chinese central bank is predicting the emergence of a “multi-polar international monetary system” in which the renminbi would compete with other major currencies rather than immediately displace the dollar.
Despite those ambitions, the yuan still plays a limited role in global reserves.
According to International Monetary Fund data, as of the third quarter of 2025, the U.S. dollar accounted for roughly 57% of global reserves, down from 71% in 2000.
The euro stood at about 20%, while the renminbi ranked sixth at just 1.93%.
Analysts say China faces major obstacles.
Global reserve currencies typically require open capital accounts and full convertibility, steps Beijing has been reluctant to take due to concerns over capital flight and financial instability.
China’s trading partners have also pressured Beijing to allow a stronger yuan, arguing that the currency remains undervalued and helps fuel China’s massive trade surplus, which reached $1.2 trillion last year.
IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva has previously urged China to address economic “imbalances,” including deflation that she said contributed to real exchange rate depreciation.
Chinese officials insist they are not manipulating the currency for trade advantage.
People’s Bank of China Vice Governor Zou Lan said last month that Beijing has no intention of weakening the renminbi to boost exports.
For now, policymakers have tolerated modest appreciation against the dollar, even as the yuan continues to weaken against the euro.
Analysts caution that Xi’s push is a long-term project rather than an imminent shift.
“Xi’s rhetoric won’t flip global foreign exchange markets today,” said Han Shen Lin of The Asia Group, “but it cements a long-term tilt investors are already sniffing out.”
In short, Beijing is signaling that it believes the dollar’s dominance is no longer untouchable.
As such, Communist China intends to position the yuan as a strategic counterweight in a changing global order.
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