The swaps allow exporters to place their dollars with banks and get yuan instead, but through a contract that will eventually reverse the flows and give them back their dollars.
However, while they remove a much-needed source of dollar supplies into spot yuan markets, analysts reckon Chinese monetary authorities can't really force exporters to convert dollars.
When exporters swap higher-yielding dollars for the cheaper yuan for even 3 months, they get local currency for business needs and also earn a pick-up of an annualised 3.5% on the swap deal.
"By trading FX swaps, exporters can postpone their settlements while meeting their yuan demand," said Becky Liu, head of China macro strategy at Standard Chartered Bank.
Exporters' swaps, meanwhile, give state banks a pile of dollars to use in their yuan operations, in which they can undertake swaps to acquire the dollars from the onshore forwards market and sell them in the spot market to stem fast yuan declines.
Persons:
Dado Ruvic, Ding, Gary Ng, Becky Liu, Jindong Zhang, Winni Zhou, Tom Westbrook, Vidya Ranganathan, Kim Coghill
Organizations:
REUTERS, Rights, U.S, Federal Reserve, Asia Pacific, Traders, Administration of Foreign Exchange, Standard Chartered Bank, China Merchants Bank, Thomson
Locations:
Rights SHANGHAI, SINGAPORE, U.S, Shanghai, China, Natixis, Singapore