ABSTRACT
In 2018 China announced a wide array of measures that promised to open up the country’s capital markets to international firms. The core information technologies that have contributed to the rapid modernization of China’s financial sector are mainly purchased from leading Western suppliers. Despite fierce pressure from both outside and inside the country, China’s leaders decided not to open up the country’s financial sector in the same fashion as Latin America and Eastern Europe. The package formed the foundation of China’s development in the decade after the global financial crisis. It made a major contribution to the stability of the whole structure of China’s political economy. Global firms also dominate the activities that are ancillary but essential to capital markets, such as legal services, audit, consultancy, data provision and ratings agencies. In many respects the operational mechanism of China’s financial firms is different from that of the leading global firms.
