Good Morning. Welcome to The Wire’s daily news roundup. Each day, our staff gathers the top China business, finance, and economics headlines from a selection of the world’s leading news organizations.
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The Wall Street Journal
- Huawei Accused in Suit of Installing Data ‘Back Door’ in Pakistan Project — Small U.S. software maker alleges Chinese telecom giant sought live access to data in Pakistan; Huawei denies claim.
- Alibaba Employee Was Sexually Abused Multiple Times, Say Chinese Authorities — Chinese police account supports many allegations by a female Alibaba employee, who said she was sexually assaulted by her boss and a business client the same night.
- U.S. Economy Likely to Outgrow China’s Due to Contrast in Pandemic Responses — A faster short-term U.S. expansion would delay the day when China’s economy overtakes America’s in size.
- China’s Corporate Crackdown Adds to Junk-Bond Distress — Government campaign to reduce debt in sectors such as real estate has put many developers in tight spot, sending high-yield bond prices tumbling.
- Group Behind Some of Hong Kong’s Biggest Protests to Disband — Civil Human Rights Front joins other organizations that have folded under pressure from national-security law imposed by China.
The Financial Times
- China to ‘respect choices of Afghan people’ following Taliban takeover — Beijing offers support to militant group while state media scorns ‘unreliability’ of Washington’s commitments to allies.
- Delta variant and floods spark anxiety over Chinese growth — Biggest Covid outbreak this year coincides with signs of deeper structural shifts in the economy.
- China green energy stocks clean up after Beijing crackdown — Tighter scrutiny over key sectors set to benefit advanced manufacturing and renewable energy companies.
- Investors pivot from ecommerce to chips to avoid China crackdown — Funds target semiconductors and biotech groups following regulatory assault on tech sector.
- Chinese police detain ex-Alibaba manager in sexual assault case — Scandal rocks Jack Ma’s ecommerce group as tech crackdown targets online games and corporate culture.
- Lithuania’s president vows to be ‘decisive’ in spats with China and Belarus — Gitanas Nauseda says country will defend values of democracy and can deal with ‘complicated neighbours.’
The New York Times
- How Beijing Has Buried Hong Kong’s Last Vestige of Democracy — The landslide victory of pro-democracy politicians in local elections in 2019 was a stunning rebuke of Beijing. Now, fear of retaliation has driven them to quit.
- A Pricey Drive Down Montenegro’s Highway ‘From Nowhere to Nowhere’ — The Montenegrin leader says that an almost $1 billion Chinese-built highway approved by his predecessor has badly strained the country’s finances.
Caixin
- Graft Buster Reveals Details of Corruption in China’s Rural Credit System — The rural networks have long lacked sufficient regulatory oversight.
- Regulators Take Action Against 19 Institutions Over STAR Market Price Violations — Probe was launched into more than 40 stocks after ‘high occurrence of uniform offering prices,’ Caixin has learned.
- SMIC Plunges in Shanghai as Regulator Removes It From Stock Connect Index — Leading Chinese semiconductor maker is registered in the Cayman Islands, making it ineligible for the domestic registration-only trading program.
South China Morning Post
- China’s semiconductor output hits record high in July as new capacity added to meet strong demand — China’s integrated circuit (IC) output rose more than 41.3 per cent year on year to reach 31.6 billion units in July, a new monthly record.
- China kills almost 300 partnerships with elite foreign universities in places like New York, London and Hong Kong, after private tutoring ban — China’s education authorities terminated 286 cooperative programmes between Chinese and foreign universities last week as part of a routine assessment of collaborative arrangements with foreign institutions.
- Shenzhen is giving 2 million yuan to cross-border e-commerce merchants as ‘made in China, sold on Amazon’ sellers continue to suffer — Shenzhen, known as China’s Silicon Valley, is offering cross-border e-commerce merchants a subsidy of 2 million yuan (US$308,000) as the “made in China, sold on Amazon” community continues to suffer from the US e-commerce giant’s crackdown on review fraud.
- China should tighten its grip on video games that distort history, says the country’s top radio broadcaster — China’s regulators should tighten their grip on video games to avoid the distortion of history, according to top radio broadcaster China National Radio (CNR), adding even more uncertainty to one of the country’s strongest industries.
Bloomberg
- World’s Third-Busiest Port Remains Partially Shut in China — China’s Ningbo-Zhoushan container port, the world’s third-busiest, remained partially closed for a sixth day Monday, amid ongoing concern over whether the shutdown will disrupt trade from the region longer term.
- Facebook to Expand Planned Undersea Cable Network in Africa — Facebook Inc. and some of the world’s largest telecommunications carriers, China Mobile Ltd. and MTN Group Ltd., are set to build a wider-than-earlier planned giant sub-sea cable in Africa.
- China Wants to Shut Down Thousands of Dams — As President Xi Jinping calls for greater environmental protection, officials are eager to demolish badly-planned dams. But the country will need vast amounts of clean hydroelectric power to meet its net-zero goal.
Reuters
- Afghanistan puts China firmly on leadership hook — The pressure is on to show that China can help stabilise Afghanistan economically while protecting Chinese investments nearby.
- Valuing China assets no easy task after $1 trillion wipeout — Any veteran investor will tell you that financial markets overshoot when trouble hits, but what if that market is the world’s second-largest economy and the government has decided the rules of the game have changed?
- China’s Didi improves pay transparency for drivers — China’s Didi Global Inc said on Monday it will provide its drivers in several Chinese cities with more details on the fees they receive, the first big move by the ride-hailing giant after state media accused it of paying drivers unfairly.
Other Publications
- The Information: Beijing Tightens Grip on ByteDance by Quietly Taking Stake, China Board Seat — Chinese government in April quietly took a stake and a board seat in TikTok owner ByteDance’s key Chinese entity, according to corporate records and people with knowledge of the matter.
- Associated Press: Detainee says China has secret jail in Dubai, holds Uyghurs — A young Chinese woman says she was held for eight days at a Chinese-run secret detention facility in Dubai along with at least two Uyghurs, in what may be the first evidence that China is operating a so-called “black site” beyond its borders.
- War on the Rocks: A Reluctant Embrace: China’s New Relationship with the Taliban — As the United States withdraws from Afghanistan and leaves a security vacuum there, is China moving in by cozying up to the Taliban?
- Foreign Policy: China Is Protecting Its Thin Corridor to the Afghan Heartland — The Wakhan Corridor is a fiercely contested imperial hangover.
- Nikkei Asia: Tencent Music’s plan stalls for $5bn Hong Kong listing in 2021 — Share plunge, regulatory crackdown and market unrest drive delay.
