New Clearing Facility for HK Dollar Checks Set up in GuangdongThe Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) announced Monday that it has signed an agreement with the Guangzhou Branch of the People's Bank of China on setting up a new joint clearing facility to speed up the Hong Kong dollar checks processing.Implemented by Hong Kong Interbank Clearing Limited (HKICL) and the Guangzhou Electronic Banking Settlement Center, the new facility will reduce the time required for clearing of such Hong Kong dollar checks presented in Guangdong down to two working days and streamline the collection and delivery of the checks to HKICL for processing. Under the existing practice, clearing and settling of Hong Kong Dollar checks issued by banks in Hong Kong and presented in Guangdong may take up to four working days before good funds can be credited to the payees' accounts in Guangdong. A similar check clearing facility has been set up between Hong Kong and Shenzhen since January, 1998, which has been functioning very well. In 1999, 84,000 checks were processed involving a total value of 7 billion Hong Kong dollars (897.4 million U.S. dollars). |
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