China should promote the internationalisation of the yuan in a process that could take 15 to 20 years, the head of China's social security fund was quoted as saying on Saturday. The official Xinhua news agency quoted Dai Xianglong, chairman of China's National Council for Social Security Funds, as saying said that the internationalisation of the yuan would be a step for reforming the international monetary system.
The system, he said, had failed to adapt to patterns of global economic development. Internationalisation may take 15 to 20 years, Dai was quoted as saying. The process could be accelerated by increasing the circulation of the yuan overseas and by faster efforts to open up China's large commercial banks. China will allow its companies to make overseas investments in yuan, the central bank said this week as another key step in expanding the currency's role in the global economy.