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
- India’s Infrastructure Push Is Key to Taking on China — Infrastructure investment could be a backbone of India’s economic growth. It just needs a lot more private money.
- Apple Is Being Overtaken by Chinese Smartphone Rivals—in Cars — Huawei, Xiaomi introduce electric vehicles designed to work with their phones.
- The Dominant Dollar Faces a Backlash in the Oil Market — An estimated 20% of global oil this year was bought and sold in other currencies as Russia and Iran sold cargoes to China and other buyers.
- The Marines Transformed to Take On China. Will They Be Ready for Everything Else? — A plan to redesign the Corps stirred warnings that it might have gone too far.
- China Wants to Move Ahead, but Xi Jinping Is Looking to the Past — As China’s leader embraces more elements of Mao Zedong’s rule, its people are confronting a more uncertain future.
The Financial Times
- Predictions: China’s record-low births will leave a global mark — A longer-term economic impact comes from a shrinking labour force.
- China removes 3 defence company bosses from top political body — Dozens of senior cadres have been ensnared in Xi Jinping’s sweeping overhaul of the armed forces.
- Foreign investors unwind $33bn bet on China growth rebound — Almost 90% of money that flowed into Chinese stocks in 2023 has left amid concern about economy.
- In the hawk-dove ornithology of China policy, consider the drongo — We must avoid the lazy classification of attitudes to Beijing as falling either side of two extreme positions.
The New York Times
- Jiang Ping, the ‘Conscience of China’s Legal World,’ Dies at 92 — He was removed from his university presidency after supporting pro-democracy protesters at Tiananmen Square. He remained a relentless advocate for rule of law.
Caixin
- Ex-Central Bank Official in China Sentenced to Prison for Leaking State Secrets — Sun Guofeng also took bribes and engaged in insider trading, the country’s top prosecutor says.
- Exclusive: Former Citic Bank Chair Penalized for Wrongdoing, Sources Say — Li Qingping has had her official rank downgraded post-retirement, possibly for promoting problematic executives.
- In Depth: Why China Wants Brokerages to Merge and Why It Won’t Be Easy — Expectations are growing for a wave of M&A after the country’s top leaders vowed to foster ‘first-class’ investment banks, but the industry faces a series of headwinds.
- Year in Review: Renewables Start to Power China’s Economy — Solar cells, batteries and EVs outranked China’s traditional export stars and drove the nation’s international trade in 2023.
- Year in Review: China’s Outbound Businesses Pivot to Latam, Middle East — The new focus is driven partly by declining consumer demand in established markets such as the U.S. and EU, compounded by rising trade protectionism.
South China Morning Post
- China’s economic, social development under 14th 5-year plan on track despite ‘extremely unusual’ time — China’s top economic planner says 16 of the 20 major goals included in its 14th five-year plan for 2021-25 are within expectation or better than anticipated, according to a midterm assessment.
- China calls for tougher crackdown on use of crypto for illegal forex trading — Prosecutors and forex regulators told to strengthen supervision, with cases involving Tether stablecoin highlighted.
- China’s disciplinary enforcers add ‘bad’ books, sex, drugs to serious offences — Revised CCDI regulation threatens expulsion for party members who read sensitive works in private, solicit prostitution or use narcotics.
- Some Chinese state property developers stiff their suppliers, defying edicts and worsening slump — Several of China’s major property developers have been delaying payments to small private suppliers or contractors – in direct contradiction to high-level instructions imploring their debts be settled promptly.
Nikkei Asia
- China’s Luxshare to become No. 2 iPhone assembler after $296m deal — Chinese supplier to take control of Pegatron’s Kunshan plant, deepening ties with Apple.
- Analysis: Putin promises Xi to ‘fight for five years’ in Ukraine — Meant to keep China on Russia’s side, the words in March prompted Beijing to hedge its bets.
- China-Russia ties in Arctic keep U.S. and Canada on alert — Alaska and Yukon territory share info as warships and thin-hulled tankers pass by.
Bloomberg
- PBOC Pledges to Stimulate Consumer Prices Amid Deflation Fears — China vowed to step up existing monetary policy and stimulate consumer prices, which last month continued their slide, falling at the steepest pace in three years.
- China Seeks More Global Influence With Chinese-Style Diplomacy — China wants to take a more active role in international affairs by strengthening party leadership and sticking with President Xi Jinping’s Chinese-style diplomacy, according state media reports from a top foreign affairs meeting attended by Xi this week.
- China Vanke to Sell Shares in Banyan Tree Units for $67 Million — Real estate giant China Vanke Co. is selling its stake in luxury hotel chain Banyan Tree Holdings Ltd.’s China units, a deal that will generate 480 million yuan ($67 million) for the developer seeking to weather the country’s property downturn.
- Opinion: Xi Jinping’s Year of Living Dangerously — The Chinese leader has had a tough 12 months. It looks like 2024 is going to be even more challenging. By Karishma Vaswani.
- Opinion: GOP Should Give Commerce Funding to Enforce Chip Controls on China — GOP hawks would be foolish to block additional funding for the agency responsible for enforcing export controls. By The Editorial Board.
Reuters
- China decries Taiwan for ‘hyping up’ military threat, sends warplanes — Speaking at a monthly news conference in Beijing, Chinese defence ministry spokesperson Wu Qian said Taiwan’s government was to blame for the tensions.
- China’s Xiaomi unveils first electric car, plans to become top automaker — China’s fifth-largest smartphone maker has been seeking to diversify beyond its core business to EVs amid stagnating demand for smartphones.
- China’s military lashes out at US after breakthrough talks — “The United States continues to strengthen its Asia-Pacific deployments, this is full of a Cold War mindset,” the spokesperson, Wu Qian, said on Thursday.
Other Publications
- The Information: Chinese VC and AI Founder Predicts Shakeout in China’s AI Sector — The biggest internet companies in China, such as Alibaba, Tencent, Baidu and ByteDance, as well as dozens of startups, are all developing their own LLMs, in what local media have described as “a war of 100 models.”
- The Economist: China is stoking a controversy in order to influence Taiwan’s election — Is the island’s ruling party trying to “de-sinicise” students?
- AP: US companies are picky about investing in China. The exceptions? Burgers, lattes — American fast-food chains have decided a market of 1.4 billion people is simply too delicious to pass up.
- POLITICO: The sensors in those self-driving cars have become an international dispute — The domestic lidar industry is mounting a lobbying offensive against a leading Chinese rival that’s stepping up its own PR game.
