China’s top economic officials are talking up openness in Hong Kong. Back on the mainland, authorities are showing investors just how active they remain in steering financial markets.

As Vice Premier He Lifeng pledged support Tuesday for a free and open economic environment in Hong Kong, policymakers in Beijing were deploying an array of measures aimed at influencing asset prices. The central bank moved to cool the yuan’s longest winning streak in three decades, while regulators revived stock-market rescue tools and took steps to encourage more share buybacks.

The flurry of intervention highlights the balancing act Beijing faces as it seeks to attract global capital and promote the yuan internationally while retaining firm control over markets at home. Rather than allowing big swings to run their course, authorities are signaling they remain ready to lean against moves they consider excessive.

“The common thread across recent policy interventions is a desire to promote market stability and discourage excessive one-way expectations,” said Carol Kong, a strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia.

The latest example came Tuesday, when the People’s Bank of China raised the amount of foreign currency that banks must keep in reserve to 6% from 4%. The move, which takes effect Nov. 15, helped snap a 13-day winning streak in the onshore yuan, its longest since 1996. The currency had gained more than 4% against the dollar this year, fueled by strong exports and corporate conversion flows.

To market participants, the message was less about reversing the yuan’s advance than slowing its pace. The reserve increase will withdraw about $24 billion from the market, according to Australia & New Zealand Banking Group, a relatively modest amount compared with monthly net foreign-exchange sales of about $30 billion this year.

For stocks, Beijing is trying to arrest the slide. After the CSI 300 Index suffered its worst monthly drop in more than a decade in October and completed a record 12-week losing streak, authorities have dusted off tools introduced during the 2024 market rescue. The PBOC said it will conduct operations under a swap facility that allows securities firms, funds and insurers to exchange assets for more liquid ones that can be used to buy shares.

Officials are also cutting the rate on a relending program that finances corporate share buybacks and stake increases to 1% from 1.25% and making the facility permanent. More than 100 billion yuan ($15 billion) of quotas under the swap facility have already been sought by securities and fund firms.

To be sure, many investors don’t see the moves in the currency and stock markets as part of a coordinated effort.

“The primary purpose of these measures are not really the same,” said Jason Chan, senior investment strategist at Bank of East Asia. “One is for directly boosting the equity market liquidity and sentiment, another is to help the export companies.”Investors have so far been less enthusiastic than when the stock measures first appeared in 2024. The CSI 300 was little changed Tuesday morning and the tech-heavy Star 50 fell as much as 3.2%, reflecting skepticism that familiar liquidity tools can overcome weak economic growth and uncertainty over corporate earnings.

“I view these types of ‘stabilization’ measures as temporary - they cannot alter the path of fundamentals,” said Nick Ferres, chief investment officer at Vantage Point Asset Management. “The weakness in growth momentum, credit impulse and leverage is the key reason why the market in China is not performing well.”