[seanmcdirmid]

Capital controls in the USA are reactionary, you are free to transfer money, you just have to ask forgiveness rather than permission if you do something bad. In the PRC, it is all about getting lots of permission to convert your life savings from RMB into USD because you are finally leaving china after 9 years of working there.

RMB is simply only limited convertible, it is not freely convertible like CHF, EUD, AUD, USD, JPY, etc...it isn't very useful for trade, and even the Chinese will convert to dollars and use the American financial system because the Chinese system is so limited.