China in a Post-crisis World? — Insights Learned from a China Financial Market Expert

CFAA successfully held its distinguished speakers series featuring Dr. Eugene Zheng, Managing Director of Asia Affairs at Chicago Board Options Exchange at the Union League Club of Chicago on March 25, 2010. With the stabilization of the global economy and the continuous growth from Asia and China, this event provided the audience with a good opportunity to learn from Dr. Zheng with his insights on the topic “The Financial Industry in China: the Present and the Future” in the post-crisis world and beyond the current economic downturn.

Dr, Zheng started his presentation by briefly summarizing the current condition of both the US and Chinese financial market. He then pointed out that the ongoing financial crisis actually forces China to thoroughly review and re-shape its existing financial system. Before the crisis, China primarily treated its financial system as an accountant might — simply managing the nation’s money balance instead of monitoring/facilitating the overall capital market growth. He expects the function of the financial market to be strengthened in the near future.

In addition, Dr. Zheng sees great potential for the stock index futures market in China and is very confident with the Chinese financial institutions’ capability to balance risk and reward once this market is launched. He also believes the fast growing local financial market will open much more competitive career opportunities to attract global talents to join China. Moreover, Dr. Zheng also highlighted his concerns on China’s growth outlook, including the demographic issue, social welfare, the RMB stability, etc. However, he did emphasize there are great arbitrage opportunity in China’s financial market given its inefficiency.

The speech was followed by an active and exciting Q&A session and individual follow-up discussions between the attendees and Dr. Zheng after the formal session concluded. Xinhua News Agency, SuncasTV and Singtao Daily reported the event and interviewed Dr. Zheng accordingly. Following is a news coverage of the event in a local network: 芝加哥侨学网