"Sinocism is the Presidential Daily Brief for China hands"- Evan Osnos, New Yorker Correspondent and National Book Award Winner
I love the new plugin so much that I put the wrong link in yesterday’s newsletter for West Consulting Malaysia Sdn Bhd. That is the correct one. Embarrassing…
Today’s Links:
THE ESSENTIAL EIGHT
Into the shadows: risky business, global threat – FT.com $$ The first of an FT series investigates China’s precarious shadow banking system
Related: Those Chinese trusts have been awful quiet | FT Alphaville The frequency of trust fund defaults is clearly rising, but not nearly as quickly and contingently as the bear camp had imagined. Certainly, the news flow has not poisoned market sentiment in material ways. Because of the rollover and local government short-term financing, our research suggests that the peak of trust fund repayments has been pushed back from mid- 2014 to early 2015
Experts Divided on How Regulator Should Calculate Loan-to-Deposit Ratio – Caixin China Merchants Securities says interbank deposits for non-settlement purposes are most likely to be included. This would lower the industry’s general loan-to-deposit ratio by 4.6 percentage points based on a conservative estimate that half of the 10.5 trillion yuan of interbank deposits are not intended for transactions settlement, it says in a research report. This represents the mainstream view, though China International Capital Corp. disagrees. The investment bank says interbank deposits for settlement purpose and certificates of deposit (CDs) would be included in the ratio’s denominator. Assuming that the two types of deposits added up to 2 trillion yuan, this would increase banks’ capital available for lending by nearly 1 trillion yuan, the report says.
专家:近几年南疆当地民众都要躲起来喝酒|新疆|南疆|
Related: China sentences three to death for Tiananmen Square attack | Reuters Another attacker was given a life sentence, and four others received jail terms ranging from five to 20 years. Five people were killed and 40 hurt when a car plowed into a crowd at the northern edge of Tiananmen Square and burst into flames. Those killed included two bystanders and three people in the car.
Related: 北京驾车冲撞天安门金水桥案3人被判死刑_
Related: China Executes 13 in Xinjiang Region After Attacks – NYTimes.com The 13 people had been found guilty of organizing and leading terrorist groups, as well as murder, arson, theft and other crimes, according to the official Xinhua News Agency, whose report cited courts in three different cities in Xinjiang. “The 13 criminals had planned violent terrorist attacks and ruthlessly killed police officers, government officials and civilians, which took innocent lives, caused huge property loss and seriously endangered public security, according to local courts,” Xinhua said.
Related: Two dead, five injured in latest Xinjiang knife attack | The Japan Times . The report on the Hotan government’s website said the civilians — who had been playing chess — fought back and sounded an alarm, which led people from neighboring businesses and others to come and encircle the attackers with unspecified weapons. Armed police arrived just over a minute later and overpowered the attackers with the help of chess players. Two of the assailants died in the clashes, while the third was wounded and then arrested, it said, adding that four civilians were also injured.//video of the attack here
AAUP Rebukes Colleges for Chinese Institutes and Censures Northeastern Ill. – Faculty – The Chronicle of Higher Education The American Association of University Professors on Saturday urged colleges that operate Chinese language and culture centers financed by the People’s Republic of China to either scrap the partnerships or renegotiate them to promote transparency and protect academic freedom. In a statement approved last week by the AAUP’s Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure and released here on Saturday at the association’s annual conference, the AAUP argues that many colleges in the United States and Canada have sacrificed their integrity and jeopardized academic freedom by giving the Chinese government considerable say over the centers, which are known as Confucius Institutes.
Related: Beijing-backed Toronto school program comes under fire – The Globe and Mail Beijing keeps making noises about being in an ideological war with the West. The louder those noises get, the more they should expect pushback against the CIs…hard to have it both ways, though throwing money at the issue helps, especially in school districts with budget pressures // The Toronto District School Board’s newly minted Confucius Institute is in jeopardy after a committee of trustees recommended suspending its partnership with the Chinese government. The board’s planning and priorities committee passed a motion on Wednesday evening calling on all TDSB trustees and staff to investigate concerns about censorship by the Chinese government, which is quietly spreading its reach into Canadian classrooms through language and culture programs with virtually no oversight. The board will vote on the committee’s recommendation on June 18.
Troubled Shanxi Coal Mining Giant Plays for Time amid Debt Struggles – Caixin Xing Zhibin had grand visions for Shanxi Liansheng Energy Co., but what he built was a tower of debt that threatens to collapse
China aims to revamp justice system but Communist Party to retain control | Reuters China must “improve the requirements for appointing justices and prosecutors while upholding the principles of leading party officials and respecting the rule of justice”, an unnamed official in the top office in charge of judicial reforms told the official Xinhua news agency. It did not say when the pilot programs would be launched. To limit interference by local governments, provincial governments will pick judges and prosecutors and fix the budgets of local courts and procuratorates, Xinhua reported. The system currently gives local governments greater sway in appointments.
Alibaba Gives More Details About Internet Business in New IPO Filing – WSJ $$ The board, which will consist of nine members—up from the four name in the pervious filing—will include Mssrs. Tsai, Ma, Lu and Zhang, as well as independent directors Chee Hwa Tung, Walter Teh Ming Kwauk, J. Michael Evans and Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang. Jacqueline Reses, a board member since December 2012 and Yahoo chief development officer, will resign, according to the filing. The company also provided more details about its operating results for its segments, saying that transaction volume on its Taobao site totaled CNY295 billion in the three months ended March 31, up from CNY223 billion a year earlier. Meanwhile, transaction volume on its Tmall site totaled CNY135 billion for the latest quarter, versus CNY71 billion a year earlier. // the new filing at SEC Edgar
Related: Alibaba Sales Growth Slowdown Spooks Yahoo Shareholders – Bloomberg Alibaba’s first revision to its initial public offering prospectus showed sales in the quarter through March increased 39 percent as merchants allocated less of their marketing budgets to Alibaba’s platforms during the period. That compares with a growth rate of 71 percent for same quarter a year earlier. Operating margins narrowed to 45 percent from 51 percent in the prior year.
MACAU DAILY TIMES – Conflicting reports on former CE alleged investigation Two news media outlets in Hong Kong have produced conflicting reports in regard to the former chief executive Edmund Ho. Next Magazine in Hong Kong has put Edmund Ho on its front page this week, claiming that the former CE, whom the magazine said has been “controlling Macau” for the past 15 years, “is done” because of the central government’s investigation into his alleged corruption. On the other hand, Hong Kong’s Sing Tao Daily claimed that they had received information from Beijing suggesting that the report was contrived, and was only intended to provoke anti-government sentiment for other political purposes. Next Magazine claims that it has received reliable information that the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Communist Party of China has already launched an investigation into the corruption in Macau.
BUSINESS, ECONOMY AND TRADE
China PBOC Denies It Has Expanded Scope Of Reserve Cut | MNI The People’s Bank of China denied Monday that it has expanded the scope of its targeted reserve requirement cut, indicating via its official microblog that any banks which satisfy lending requirements for agriculture and small business are entitled to enjoy a lower reserve ratio. The PBOC comment follows news Monday that at least three mid-tier Chinese banks with nationwide operations have had their reserve requirement ratios lowered by 50 basis points. “We did not expand” the scope of the reserve cut, the PBOC said.
China Capital Flows Slow Sharply – WSJ China’s central bank and financial institutions bought a net 38.66 billion yuan ($6.24 billion) of foreign currency in May—the smallest tally since August, according to calculations by The Wall Street Journal, based on central bank data. There were net purchases of 116.92 billion yuan in April. “May figures show that speculative capital flows into the country have taken the (central bank’s) hint and backed off,” said Royal Bank of Canada Senior Currency Strategist Sue Trinh.
PBOC Says It Will Ease Restrictions on Cross-Border Yuan Use – Caixin The central bank recently announced it would ease restrictions on cross-border use of the yuan to support trade and facilitate foreign companies’ operations. The announcement, published on the central bank’s website on June 11, says “banking financial institutions can conduct cross-border yuan settlement for individuals operating in goods and services trade businesses.”
Corporate debt in Asia to top US, Europe combined-CNBC China, the region’s largest economy, already has more outstanding corporate debt than any other country, having surpassed the U.S. last year, according to S&P.
The paradox of China’s push to build a global currency – FT.com Therefore, the genesis of renminbi internationalisation, which will be a key theme during the UK visit this week of Prime Minister Li Keqiang, is indivisible from China’s aspiration to blaze its own trail rather than integrate into a Pax Americana in whose creation it had no say.
China’s Holdings of U.S. Treasuries Decline for Third Month – Bloomberg The country held $1.26 trillion in U.S. debt as of April, down $8.9 billion from the previous month, the Treasury Department said in a monthly report. China is the largest foreign holder of Treasuries, followed by Japan. The decline may be related to China’s foreign-exchange reserve levels, said Aaron Kohli, an interest-rate strategist at BNP Paribas in New York. China’s accumulation of reserves will diminish after hitting a record in the first quarter, a Chinese government official said last week.
FTZ will not “flourish” in China: MOC – Xinhua Free trade zones (FTZs) will not flourish everywhere in China, a senior official with the Ministry of Commerce said on Monday. The statement came almost nine months after the country’s Shanghai pilot FTZ started operating as a test bed for deepening market-oriented reforms and boosting economic vitality. At least 20 local governments have reportedly submitted proposals for similar zones.
Beijing housing sales slump 35 pct – Xinhua Real estate developers in the city sold 3.29 million square meters of housing during the period, the municipal bureau of statistics said in a statement Monday. Housing starts edged 0.3 percent lower to 4.84 million square meters.
王岐山对金融行业了如指掌 多家券商遭纪委排查-搜狐财经 CCDI reportedly now investigating many securities firms…Wang Qishan knows the industry like the back of his hand, good like hiding anything from him in the finance world // 各大证券公司正在成为纪委系统新的调查目标。
多省份加速编制地方政府资产负债表_财经频道_一财网 CBN-
青岛银行业集体沦陷德正系“骗贷案” 涉案52亿_21世纪网 more from 21CBH on the metals collateral fraud in Qingdao…18 banks involved so far // 核心提示：青岛港金属贸易融资的“骗贷”金额或刷新历史纪录，
POLITICS AND LAW
Guideline to accelerate China’s household registration reform – Xinhua The State Council, China’s Cabinet, will issue the guideline soon, said Chen Xiwen, deputy director of the Central Agricultural Work Leading Team, a top decision-making body for agriculture-related work. Having been approved by the central leading team for “comprehensively deepening reform,” the guideline is awaiting deliberation by the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, Chen said, without disclosing any of its details.
Vice Chairman of Country’s Top Political Advisory Body Faces Inquiry – Caixin As state leader, Su Rong becomes highest-ranking official to become target of graft crackdown launched in late 2012
中纪委严打外逃贪官 避免抵消国内反腐力度_网易新闻中心 CCDI says it will strengthen its efforts to go after corrupt officials fleeing overseas…wonder if the CCDI has a list of all the pRC buyers of US property, and especially in Orange County // 近日,中央纪委召开国际追逃追赃工作座谈会,中央纪委副书记、
央视郭振玺案续：另有三人被带走调查_政经频道_财新网 Thr
民主生活会不能“秀一场”（红船观澜）–观点–人民网 ap
从《纸牌屋》热透视西方发达国家腐败现象——要闻——
6.7 bln yuan misused in power grid project – Xinhua Around 6.7 billion yuan (1.1 billion U.S. dollars) was misappropriated in building and operating China’s key trans-regional power transmission project, the country’s top auditing office revealed on Monday. The results were based on audits conducted between April and July 2013 on the investment, construction and financial management of 21 projects that are part of the west-to-east power transmission program, the National Audit Office (NAO) said in a report.
长沙护士遭公务员殴打案:患者家属上访被刑拘_网易新闻中心
China deports Australian artist after Tiananmen remarks | Reuters Melanie Wang, a friend of Guo’s, told reporters at Beijing airport that he had been put on an Air China flight to Sydney.
朱善璐：以社会主义核心价值观引领立德树人工作–理论-人民网
习近平领导风格鲜明 网民称展现独特“主席范儿”-中新网 Chinese media look at Xi Jinping’s leadership style…netizens say he has “chairman-style”
中央禁令后部分官员叹官不聊生:当官越来越没劲|中央禁令|
FOREIGN AND DEFENSE AFFAIRS
Philippines calls for construction freeze in South China Sea | Reuters Albert del Rosario, foreign affairs secretary, said he supported U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia Daniel Russel’s proposal for China and Southeast Asian states to get together for dialogue. “Let’s call for a moratorium in terms of activities that escalate tension,” del Rosario told ANC Television on Monday. “Now, let’s do that while we work on an expeditious conclusion of the code of conduct and effective implementation.”
China: Philippines getting int’l sympathy through deception | The Philippine Star In a report at the 24th meeting of state parties of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), Deputy Permanent Representative Wang Min said the Philippines’ accusations against China are “false.” “[W]e must point out that the root cause of the disputes between China and the Philippines in the South China Sea is the Philippines’ illegal occupation of some islands and reefs of China’s Nansha islands (Spratlys),” Wang said. “The Philippines attempts to legalize its infringements and provocations by dragging China into arbitral proceedings. The Philippines is also trying to win international sympathy and support through deception. This is what the problem is in essence,” he added.
《环球视线》20140613越西沙闹事 敦促渔民“保家卫国”_新闻频道_央视网(cctv.com)
China Aggression Sounds Wake-Up Call for Vietnam’s Manufacturers – Bloomberg The Vietnam Textile and Apparel Association has asked its more than 1,000 members including Oanh to consider alternative supply sources to China, according to Deputy General Secretary Nguyen Van Tuan, even as bilateral trade between the two countries rose 84 percent to $50.2 billion last year from $27.3 billion in 2010, according to government data. About 31 percent of Vietnam’s exports to China last year comprised agricultural products, while apparel and footwear made up 13 percent, trade ministry data showed. Forty-two percent of imports from China were telephone components, electronic spare parts, and fabric and leather for garments and footwear, with tools and machinery making up 18 percent.
Karaoke army: PLA to double troops’ entertainment budget to ‘boost combativeness’ | South China Morning Post Soldiers will soon get new jukeboxes and musical instruments as the PLA doubles its annual budget on entertainment equipment in an effort to enrich its troops’ cultural life and “boost their combativeness”, the PLA Daily reports. Other new equipment the soldiers will get include loudspeakers and cameras, the official media outlet said, citing a recently amended document on standards for “cultural equipment” for grass-roots troops.
Digital Dao: Crowdstrike’s PLA 61486 Report – Using Photoshopped Pictures? There’s something wrong with those dramatic pictures of military satellite dishes contained in the Crowdstrike report on Chen Ping and PLA 61486. This is especially troubling since they play such a big role in Crowdstrike’s attribution theory.
Nick Clegg: China is guilty of large scale human rights abuses – Telegraph China is guilty of “large scale and systematic” human rights abuses, Nick Clegg has said on the first morning of a three-day visit to London by Premier Li Keqiang. The Chinese people are “shackled” to a one-party communist regime that is the “antithesis” of an open democratic society, Mr Clegg said.
时殷弘:不应过度强调丝绸之路建设主导权 interestin
两极分化动摇美国人逐梦信心–国际–人民网 People’
Let North Korea Collapse – NYTimes.com former CIA analyst in a NYT OpEd, adapted from a forthcoming Foreign Affairs essay…hope the longer essay has a bit more sense about how China sees the issue // Even China, a putative ally of the Kim regime, would benefit from its fall: Beijing would no longer have to supply the North with fuel, food and other goods, and pay the diplomatic cost of supporting a pariah state.
HONG KONG, MACAO AND TAIWAN
Watch The Dying Art Of Neon Sign-Making In Hong Kong “These signs are starting to disappear quickly,” Aric Chen, a curator at the city’s futuristic M+ museum, told The Wall Street Journal this spring. “As the saying goes, you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone.” The museum is hoping to turn the tide back with a sprawling, online exhibit. On display through the end of June, NEONSIGNS.HK includes a dense timeline of neon history, user-submitted photos of neon signs in Hong Kong, and a steady stream of essays and other musings. One of the gems of the exhibit is the video above, a short documentary about the dying industry.
TECH AND MEDIA
China cracks down on Apple’s iMessage–TechinAsia The measures include tools to monitor and prevent spam messages, which the ministry says are prevalent on the iOS default messaging app. The report says iMessage’s vulnerabilities to spam have cost users “millions” of RMB. Up to this point, TechWeb notes iMessage has been in a “vacuum” area void of regulation.
Silver Lake Is Selling Chinese Marketing Firm Allyes – WSJ Silver Lake has been selling Allyes in three stages, one of the people said. It sold the company’s advertising agency division for around $130 million last month and the research business for around $60 million more recently, a person familiar with the matter said. The firm is currently in the process of selling Allyes’ digital marketing technology business, a division that will likely sell for less than $100 million, a person familiar with the matter said. Silicon Valley-based Silver Lake paid $124 million for Allyes when it bought the interactive marketing firm. The firm declined to comment on the deal.
Shanghai Film Fest: John Cusack, Adrien Brody to Star in Jackie Chan’s ‘Dragon Blade’ – The Hollywood Reporter John Cusack and Adrien Brody will star as Roman soldiers lost in ancient times in Hong Kong action star Jackie Chan’s latest project, the historical epic Dragon Blade. The movie has finished shooting at Hengdian World Studios and will soon start shooting on location in the historic city of Dunhuang and the Gobi Desert, Chan said at the Shanghai Film Festival.
Peel gets another major investment from Alibaba, strikes alliances in China — Tech News and Analysis Smart remote control app maker Peel just got another major cash infusion from China’s e-commerce giant Alibaba. Peel and Alibaba didn’t disclose the amount of funding, but the investment comes after Alibaba gave Peel $5 million in cash in 2013, and I hear this second round of funding is larger than that previous round.
Chinese gov’t reveals Microsoft’s secret list of Android-killer patents | Ars Technica More likely, Microsoft was compelled to produce the list to appease Chinese regulators, who feared that the software giant could become more aggressive with its patents after the Nokia purchase. It seems equally likely that Microsoft wouldn’t be too thrilled about the patents being published on a public webpage. In fact, the English-language version of the MOFCOM site about the merger doesn’t have the patent lists.
搜房网被迫下调5亿端口费 中介联盟自称“完胜”_TechWeb Soufun gives in to real estate agents, cuts its listing fees, perhaps by 500m rmb // 据经济之声《天下财经》报道，在多地房产中介结成行业联盟，
任正非首次接受国内媒体专访：能够阻挡我们的就是腐败_
SOCIETY, ART, SPORTS, CULTURE AND HISTORY
Chinese investors buying up U.S. golf courses – Los Angeles Times Du and other wealthy Chinese investors are quickly adding golf courses to their growing portfolios of U.S. holdings. In the last year, Chinese investors have bought prime properties including the 2,000-acre Sea Trail Golf Resort, built around three Sunset Beach, N.C., courses, along with smaller ones, such as Rancho Duarte Golf Club, a nine-hole, par-31 course built on a former dump in the San Gabriel Valley. “We’re seeing a lot of tires getting kicked by the Chinese,” said broker Jeffrey Woolson in Carlsbad, managing director for golf and resorts at real estate services giant CBRE Group Inc. “They only recently came forward and started buying. They do love golf, so it makes sense.”
央视揭“神医”骗局：学员“感动”跪倒痛哭流涕_新闻_腾讯网
Heard in the Hutong: The Chinese View on Gay Marriage – China Real Time Report – WSJ Shanghai Pride, a weeklong gay pride celebration, kicked off last week in what organizers call China’s most gay-friendly city. China Real Time hit the streets of Beijing to see how people feel about gay marriage and how attitudes have changed over the years.
SOHO CEO Now Apologizes for Striking Shenzhen Airport Staffer | Nanfang Insider After having categorically denied that he hit a Shenzhen Airlines worker last week, SOHO CEO Pan Shiyi has now apologized for getting physical with the staffer. Pan said he was sorry the woman was hurt but that it was not his fault. “I accidentally bumped the girl and I immediately apologized,” Pan said.
Wander On, O Yidden: China and the Jewish Diaspora (III) | Hebrew Hutong In part I of this series, I talked about why China becoming a major center of world Judaism was desirable and possible; in Part II, I examined the social and domestic policy challenges that are making this increasingly unlikely; here, in the third and final part of this essay, I explain how the long-term drivers of Chinese policy bode ill for Judaism in China.
How to Be a Male God | the Anthill Last weekend I was one of the privileged few to part with 50 yuan and go to a “sharing session” of Cirl’s pick up wisdom, as part of my research into Chinese youth subcultures (no, honestly!). PUACirl, as the group is called, advertised on Bad Boys (坏男孩) website (“techniques for chasing girls and dating”), which has 38823 followers on Weibo. They hold events in cities across China, from talks to a fortnightly outing to MIX club in Beijing (450 yuan for expert wingmen).
OMG, in Conversation With Jessica Beinecke-Sinica Podcast | ChinaFile Kaiser Kuo and Jeremy Goldkorn interview Jessica Beinecke, host of the VOA-funded OMG Meiyu, a Chinese show on English slang that has earned Jessica hundreds of thousands of followers in China. Now the owner of her own production company, Jessica is on the show to chat about her future plans and other projects. She is joined by David Moser, longtime Sinica stalwart and Director of the CET immersion program in Beijing
The Resurgence of Gender Inequality in China-Sinica Podcast | ChinaFileKaiser and Jeremy are joined by David Moser and Leta Hong Fincher, newly-minted Ph.D. and author of Leftover Women, a book which gazes into the state of women’s rights in China, and documents the way state-sanctioned propaganda, family-driven social pressures, and legal customs in things like the housing market all effectively conspire to roll back much of the progress on gender equality China has made over the last twenty years
ENERGY, ENVIRONMENT, SCIENCE AND HEALTH
CNPC Takes Big Gamble with Canadian Oil Sands Projects – Caixin While China’s other petroleum giants play it safe, the country’s largest producer of oil goes all in on two projects in Canada
News Analysis: China to accelerate nuclear power development – Xinhua At the end of 2013, nuclear power accounted for a paltry 2.11 percent of China’s total, dwarfed by 80.4 percent of thermal power and 15 percent for hydropower. The installed nuclear power capacity represented only 1.19 percent to total power generation capacity. The need to conserve energy, reduce emissions and steer away from reliance on coal–the dirtiest form of energy–has never been more obvious. China aims to reduce energy consumption per unit of GDP by 16 percent from the 2010 level by 2015. The indicator dropped 9.03 percent from 2011 to 2013, accounting for only 54 percent of the overall target.
我国石墨资源或成下个稀土：20年内将耗尽_21世纪网 wil
High altitude medicine lab established in NW China – Xinhua The lab is a joint projext by Qinghai University and the University of Utah. Scientists from the two universities have been partners in academic exchange, personnel training and research collaboration since a cooperative agreement in April 2010.
BEIJING
北京公办高中今年起停收择校费 严禁教师兼职_新闻_腾讯网 Beijing looks to be getting serious about cracking down on corruption in education // 昨日，市教委等五部门发布《