Speaking at Bloomberg Invest 2026, Paul Chan reassured global markets that foreign capital remains completely free to enter the territory and stay forever.
Hong Kong Financial Secretary Paul Chan used his appearance at Bloomberg Invest 2026 to reassure global markets that despite Beijing’s recent crackdown on cross-border capital flows, foreign money remains completely free to enter the territory and permanently integrate into the local banking system.
Speaking with Bloomberg’s Yvonne Man, Chan sought to calm international anxieties by drawing a sharp distinction between illicit capital flight and the highly encouraged practice of wiring billions of dollars into Chinese banks with no expectation of ever seeing it again.
"We are still encouraging legitimate inflows," Chan told the audience of institutional investors, defining a legitimate inflow as any transaction that securely deposits foreign currency into a mainland-regulated account and then quietly forgets it exists. Chan emphasized that the recent regulatory measures are strictly targeted at "suspicious outflows," a legal category encompassing any withdrawal, dividend repatriation, or offshore transfer requested by the person who originally deposited the money.
The Secretary made it extremely clear that Hong Kong remains a frictionless, dynamic environment for abandoning capital.
Financial analysts in attendance noted that Chan’s remarks successfully clarified Beijing’s economic policy for the coming year, confirming that the central government remains deeply committed to global financial integration, provided the integration operates precisely like a roach motel for venture capital.
At the close of the session, Chan warmly invited foreign asset managers to continue utilizing Hong Kong as a premier global hub for converting their clients' liquid assets into permanent municipal infrastructure.