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Today, as the outlook for the China-U.S. conflict remains uncertain, and trade protectionism and unilateralism continue to rise, how can we protect what we have achieved so far, thanks to globalization and free trade, and actively solve problems such as the widening wealth gap and the migration crisis? This will determine whether we can continue to enjoy postwar economic stability and prosperity, the advancement of technology, and the development of society.

Since the global financial crisis, China’s state-owned enterprises have experienced a cycle of expansion. First, there has been a U-turn from the previous dropping number of nonfinancial state-owned enterprises; second, state-owned enterprises have achieved a higher growth rate in their total assets. However, due to the growth of the private sector, state-owned enterprises’ percentage of domestic GDP decreased from 2007 to 2017. How should we understand the expansion of state-owned enterprises since the global financial crisis? What caused it? Where did the money for the expansion come from?

Along with its economic development, China’s collectibles market, while still in its infancy, has been growing quickly. Based on our experience as collectors, we will share stories on the art market, the relationship between collection and investment, as well as between collection and life, in order to shed light on the latest trends in the art market.

Every revolution is essentially a revolution of power. Chips, or semiconductors, which have been the driving force behind the most recent information technology revolution, are going through new changes. How can the semiconductor industry seize the opportunities brought about by new technologies like 5G, the IoT, and AI? How can the industry, which is typical of the international cooperation model, brace for the challenges caused by recent international political turbulence? In the long term, how can more people enjoy the convenience and wealth brought by information technologies?

The new economy is an economic structure that can better accommodate China’s future resource endowments, and one in which China’s future growth point lies. The new economy brings disruptive changes to areas such as business models, production methods, organization methods and resource allocation. What is “new” in China's “new economy”? What role will the “new economy” play in China’s economic structure? What investment opportunities may arise following the emergence of the “new economy”?

Reduced biological diversity may be one of the most direct results of global warming and ecological changes. Meanwhile, some dietary habits and health practices will also have an impact on the number of animal species. How we can achieve a balance between biological diversity, the protection of important animal species, and the continuation of human behaviors will determine whether we can make animal protection sustainable.

Urbanization, including the concept of smart city and urban clustering, has evolved into a second phase. What new opportunities will be brought by the smart cities? How can “rural China” successfully transcend to “urban and rural China”? What implications do free trade zones and the free trade ports have on the development of Chinese cities? From Xiong’an New Area and the Yangtze River Economic Belt to the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, how can China promote regional coordinated development and build a world-class city cluster?

Innovation and governance have always been two sides of the same coin. As breakthroughs continue to be made in financial technologies, more effective financial governance is also developed. Since consumer finance services are now no longer as popular as they were, we need to think about how the financial industry should shift their focus towards businesses and how regulators should prepare for such a shift.

The recent decade has seen twists and turns in the globalization of Chinese enterprises. Since the beginning of this century Chinese enterprises have set out to explore overseas markets, and in 2016 the number of overseas acquisitions and mergers by Chinese enterprises reached its peak. Recently, however, governments have begun to tighten reviews for foreign investments and domestic regulators have also tightened their regulations against blind capital outflows. Looking back upon the past twenty years, there have undoubtedly been highlights but there are also regrets, too. Now it’s time for us to review the dos and don’ts we have learned.

More efforts have been made to push ahead supply-side reform to solve the problems of unbalanced and inadequate development and to take advantage of methods such as capacity reduction, destocking, deleveraging, cost reduction and improving underdeveloped areas. This will optimize supply structure, eliminate supply redundancy, boost supply capacity and increase effective supply, and continuously push forward the transition of China’s economy toward a quality development model. How will supply-side reform lead the industrial transformation and upgrades? How can we open up more space for the new economy? How can we use the financial supply-side reform to support the real economy? How can we accelerate the transition to a high-quality development model by switching from a factor-driven model to an innovation-driven model, and improving the quality of capital and human capital?

After the twists and turns of recent years, China and Japan have finally returned to a stable and increasingly close relationship since the end of last year. Leaders of both countries have increased the frequency of their exchanges. The state visit of the President of China to Japan in the next year will provide new momentum for the relationship between the two countries. Today, as the political relationship between the two continues to thaw, in this new era of the Sino-Japanese relation, it’s becoming increasingly important to understand how to seize opportunities and further cooperation to create more investment opportunities, maintain the global free trade system, and speed up negotiation for the regional free trade agreement.

Whether it’s last century’s industrialized enterprises shaping globalization or the 21st century’s internet giants leading innovation, transitions from era to era have always been radical. In the face of complicated domestic and international political and economic environments, businesses today face more uncertainties. Compared with businesses of previous centuries, what is the largest driving force for today’s businesses? As Chinese businesses continue to go international, how can they successfully finish the transition from selling products overseas to making their brands known globally? In the face of new opportunities as China continues to further its opening up efforts in the new era, how can foreign businesses and Chinese business carry out mutually beneficial cooperation? To ensure the sustainability of development, how should founders and entrepreneurs handle the changes and continuities in the new era?

This session will focus on the future relationship among banks, financial technologies and large technology companies, and their resulting influence on the financial service ecosystem. The conference will also discuss topics such as the two-way opening of capital markets and the development of the asset management industry.

So far as the trade dispute goes, there is finally a phase one trade deal, which dispels the shadow of a deteriorating economic situation that had been haunting the capital market and global economy for the past year and a half. However, the uncertainty in China-U.S. relations does not just disappear because of the deal, and the long-time cooperation-competition relationship now inclines more and more to the competition side. On the 40th anniversary of China-U.S. diplomatic relations, what should both countries learn from past conflicts, and how should we prepare for the future? Is China-U.S. decoupling a general trend or a downward spiral? How can the United States avoid a zero-sum mindset with China, and how should China convince global society that its rise is an opportunity rather than a challenge?

In the era of digitalization, what are the financial barriers to making the leap from “inclusive” to “beneficial”? As inclusive finance has been developed mainly to support private businesses and midsize, small and micro businesses, how should supervising authorities and market institutes work with each other to truly deliver benefits to these businesses? How can banks, as the major participants, take advantage of new technologies to innovate service models and boost service efficiency?

Thanks to new policies and new technologies, China’s health care industry has seen unprecedented opportunities and the Chinese people now can better safeguard their health. Looking forward, how can the advancement of technologies and improved health awareness lead the health management revolution? How can new interconnections between the insurance, medical care, and pharmaceutical industries better meet the diverse needs of people? What else should we do to achieve the goals of the Healthy China 2030 strategy? How can we leverage supply-side reform in health care services to open up the market and increase the supply of health care products? In a more open and diverse market, what is going to push forward the healthy development of the industry? What will be the driving force of new trends?

The goals, progress and challenges of financial supply-side reform; system design and improvement during the clearing of financial risks; the relationship between improved financial supervision and an enhanced financial market mechanism, and how to make choices; why and how should we stick to financial opening up now.

For the financial industry around the world, it is becoming a significant trend to use technologies to empower financial services. As financial technologies continue to reshape and innovate traditional financial services, it brings new opportunities and challenges in terms of correcting excessive or insufficient regulation efforts and improving China’s modern financial governance system.

How will financial technologies influence monetary policies? How should we innovate our supervision measures and mechanisms? What can we learn from other countries to strike a balance in supervision with financial technologies?

The currency pattern has gradually evolved from physical currency, metal currency, and paper money to digital currency, while stablecoins with anchored benchmark design are having a broad and far-reaching impact on economic activity and currency order. What changes will the stablecoins bring to circulation efficiency, cross-border payment, inclusive finance and anti-money laundering? What are the challenges to the existing international monetary system? How to regulate stablecoins? What new historical opportunities will be brought about in the digital financial era?

As financial technologies continue to redefine financial institutions, how will they reshape the landscape of traditional financial services? What new opportunities may arise as China opens up its inclusive finance and green finance? How to establish a management system to regulate the development of financial technologies?

In the midst of a sluggish global macroeconomy and an increasingly fluctuating international financial market, how will major central banks adjust their monetary policies? With a low interest rate and an increasingly fluctuating capital market, how can we improve our investment portfolios? How will the inclusion of China’s A-shares and bonds by international mainstream indices influence the global investment landscape? How can new economy companies make use of their own advantages and choose the right location from the US, the Chinese Mainland, and Hong Kong for their IPO? For investments coming into China, how is the outlook for new economy industries such as healthcare, artificial intelligence, financial technology, and new energy vehicles?

International financial institutes and market participants now have a greater demand for risk avoidance. In 2020, what would investors’ risk preferences be like worldwide? How should these investors allocate their investments such as stocks and bonds? In light of the increasingly severe fluctuations seen in major asset categories, how can we find long-term value in asset allocation while avoiding short-term fluctuations? With a low interest rate, how will alternative investments play a significant role? How can investors adjust both their active and passive investments? After the adoption of new policies and regulations on asset management, what are the challenges and opportunities for asset management in China?

The year 2019 has seen accelerated development of the ESG investment philosophy in China, with more and more effort put into supervision and policy development, and more and more investment from all parties. However, it will be difficult for the Chinese market to meet the ESG international standard. The construction of infrastructure such as the ESG database for the A-share market cannot be finished soon and the innovation and application of ESG products continue to face more challenges. Where will China’s ESG integration go?

What challenges may arise for the implementation of ESG investment philosophy? Are there factors that deserve our special attention? What would be the difference between the domestic and international ESG markets? How can market players and regulators join hands to establish an ESG information disclosure, evaluation, and investment standard that can meet the needs of the A-share market?

What are ESG investment strategies, and how should the data in a quantified model be processed? How should we balance short-term performance evaluation and the long-term returns of ESG? What is the relationship between performance and returns in an ESG model? What kind of challenges may arise in the innovation of ESG financial products?