Yuan’s Global Popularity Keeps Rising With Usage at Record High

(Bloomberg) -- The Chinese yuan is making deeper inroads as a currency of choice for global payments, with international transactions climbing to their highest level ever. 

Payments using the renminbi, as the currency is also known, jumped to a record 3.2% of market share, according to data from the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications, breaking through its previous high set in 2015 that came on the back of a currency devaluation in a bid to increase exports.

Usage has jumped in the past three months as international funds boosted holdings of Chinese government bonds, pushing their share to a fresh record, and amid gas producer Gazprom (MCX:GAZP) Neft’s decision to accept yuan rather than dollars for fueling the Russian airplanes at China’s airports. The currency retained its fourth place in the past two months, compared with being the 35th most-popular medium of exchange for payments in October 2010 when Swift, which handles cross-border payment messages for more than 11,000 financial institutions in 200 countries, started tracking.

Despite its rise in the rankings and having upped its market share by orders of magnitude over the last 12 years, the renminbi is still dwarfed in popularity by its more established peers, notably the U.S. dollar and the euro. 

The dollar kept its top spot in January, a position it’s held since June, even though its market share fell to about 39.9% from 40.5% in December. The euro also lost ground but held onto second place, while the British pound and yen rounded out the top five in third and fifth place, respectively. 

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