Hi Alison,
Thank you for your message.
CNY is the Chinese Yuan that’s traded in mainland China, while CNH is the Chinese Yuan traded offshore from the mainland, for example, in Hong Kong. Basically, the difference hinges on where the trade, or transaction, takes place.
In case useful background, ‘Renminbi’ is the official name for the Chinese currency and means ‘people’s money’ in Mandarin. The ‘Yuan’ is the currency unit, much like in the UK our currency is officially called ‘Pound sterling’ and the unit is the ‘pound’.
You then have the two types of Yuan we’ve already discussed: CNY (not typically available for online trading) and CNH (available offshore and supported by several brokers, such as IG and IB).
James Barra