(Yicai Global) March 13 -- The International Monetary Fund's Staff Retirement Plan, its pension scheme, is looking for investment opportunities in China, a spokesman for the organization told Yicai Global.

"The IMF Staff Retirement Plan (IMF SRP) and IMF Investment Account pursue very broad sets of investment opportunities and are structured as globally diversified portfolios across multiple asset classes. The RQFII license would allow both the IMF SRP and Investment Account to access a larger set of onshore investments in China and help extend their long-term portfolio diversification," the spokesman said.

" IMF SRP's and Investment Account's assets are managed separately and independently from the regular financial and lending operations of the IMF vis-à-vis member countries," he added.

The IMF plays a major role in international money markets. Its main functions are providing emergency finance for members struggling to balance payments, to promote international cooperation in the financial and monetary fields and to maintain international exchange rate order.

The China Securities Regulatory Commission recently announced online that it had approved the IMF as a Renminbi Qualified Foreign Institutional Investor. The news has attracted a lot of attention as the IMF's investment functions are typically not well known to the outside world.

Editor: James Boynton