Interview: Euronext to seize "indispensable" opportunities of China: official

Euronext, one of the world's largest exchange networks, will seize the "indispensable " and "incredible" opportunities of China, the head of Markets and Global Sales of Euronext Lee Hodgkinson said in a recent interview with Xinhua.

Euronext will make efforts to place itself at the heart of the economic links between China and Europe, he said.

Trade links between China and Europe "are only continuing to grow", Hodgkinson judged, adding that "we are beginning to see that really happen quite materially now, thinking about Club Med being taken over by Fosun, most recently Haitong acquiring Banco Espirito Santo in Portugal."

And there were around 300 acquisitions in Europe last year by Chinese companies, while Chinese industry is beginning to broaden its horizons beyond China and the greater Asian region into the West, the Euronext official noted.

Facing this trend, Euronext's strategy is to offer in the short-to-medium term its products for trading by Chinese investors and to really act as a middle man between China and the eurozone for bringing investors together, he said.

In this sector, Euronext has taken a series of actions as establishing partnership with Dalian Commodities Exchange and Shenzhen Exchange respectively in 2014 and 2015, and listing over five billion U.S. dollars of Renminbi debt on its markets in Paris from the beginning of this year, according to documents provided by Euronext.

Hodgkinson said he is "extremely confident in the future of the Chinese markets", partly because of the important scale of Chinese economy and partly based on the reform of capital markets in China. "The longer term thinking is how can we provide products and services within China," he said.

For a better self-promotion in China, the official internet site of Euronext will open a new version in Chinese in the near future, according to Euronext's communication service. Enditem