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The latest sign of cozying up came Wednesday afternoon via Finance Minister Bill Morneau, who told journalists Canada is applying to join the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank.

Morneau thanked China for its “initiative and leadership,” saying “we couldn’t be more supportive” of the bank’s “lean, clean and green” mandate.

The multinational development bank, announced by President Xi Jinping in 2013, has been operational for just eight months. Its goal is to stimulate growth by funding critical Asian-Pacific infrastructure projects.

The bank set a ceiling for its capital at US$100 billion, with about US$2 billion of that unallocated, said Saint-Jacques. Canada will have to negotiate with several dozen other new applicants, and states who haven’t used their full funding allocations, to figure out how much it will contribute.

The bank’s president, Liqun Jin, said on Wednesday that Canada’s announcement “affirms the way this new bank is being run.” He said the application would be dealt with “expeditiously.”

The AIIB currently has 57 members, including Brazil, Russia, India, South Africa, the U.K. and many other European countries.

The United States, however, has stayed away; its Trans-Pacific Partnership, which includes Canada but not China, is seen by many as intended to counter-balance China’s growing economic influence. But, as anti-trade sentiment boils over in the U.S, that deal seems less and less likely to actually come into being.