"Sinocism is the Presidential Daily Brief for China hands"- Evan Osnos, New Yorker Correspondent and National Book Award Winner

Subscribe Now

Thanks for reading, feel free to recommend to friends or donate on the site…

• FT Alphaville » China’s remarkable short USD position
  At best, the chart shows that China’s dollar position has become balanced over the last half year. That the dollars China takes in through exports cover the country’s dollar import costs, but that’s all. There are no surplus dollars leftover for reinvestment.This, by the way, is how Standard Chartered’s analysts interpret the data.

  They say it’s significant because it shows that we are “in a different world than in 2005-11″.

  At worst, however, the chart implies that the banking sector’s dollar purchases could be turning negative on a net basis. That, as a result, the dollars China raises through imports are no longer enough to cover its dollar import costs. That China’s corporate sector is experiencing a dollar shortage.

• Groupon China Venture to Merge With Tencent-Backed FTuan – Bloomberg
  Groupon Inc. (GRPN), the biggest daily coupon website, is combining its Gaopeng online-commerce venture in China with FTuan, a company backed by local partner Tencent Holdings Ltd. (700)
• China Yuan Rises On Heavy Demand – WSJ.com
  China’s yuan was up against the U.S. dollar late Monday because of heavy demand for the local unit from some big banks, after the dollar rose to a near seven-month high earlier in the session due to the central bank’s efforts to guide the Chinese currency lower.
• ‘They Are Scared of the Countryside’: An Interview with Chen Guangcheng by Ian Johnson | NYRblog | The New York Review of Books  what will a proliferation of cheap 3g smartphones mean?//    But Twitter is blocked; to access it you have to get past the Great Firewall of China. And a lot of activists are blocked from posting on Sina Weibo (the most popular Chinese Twitter-like service). Chen: “I think they can jump over that wall more easily than I jumped over my wall! Right now that isn’t the problem. The problem is that many ordinary Chinese can’t get online. Right now, the percentage of Chinese with cell phones is high but in the countryside Internet access is relatively low. So I think a lot of these foreign broadcasters are wrong to stop broadcasting in shortwave to China. In the past, we listened regularly to Deutsche Welle, Radio Canada International, and of course Voice of America. But countries are planning to scale back or even cut these services. This shows that these people don’t understand the situation in the countryside in China.”
• Committee of 100 Public Perception Survey
  In this pivotal year of political leadership transition unfolding in the United States and China, the Committee of 100’s Opinion Survey 2012 provides timely insight into American and Chinese attitudes toward each other on high impact issues. This year’s survey takes a comparative look at US and Chinese public and elite perceptions based on C-100’s mirror surveys conducted by American and Chinese polling firms in 2007 and 2012. In examining and integrating both years’ data and findings, C-100 has identified four overarching themes, presented in this executive summary, that characterize American and Chinese perceptions.
• China terminates island investment with North Korea｜Economy｜News｜WantChinaTimes.com
  Trade and economic cooperation between China and North Korea in Huangjinping Island on the Yalu River, which divides the two countries, has been withdrawn due to minimal economic benefit arising from the deal. This is seen as a great blow to poverty-stricken North Korea, reports the Global Times, an English-language newspaper based in China.
• ‘Mr. China’ Liam Casey is Silicon Valley’s link to Asia – Jun. 25, 2012
  You’ve never heard of Irish-born entrepreneur Liam Casey, but you’re probably carrying a gadget with parts or accessories made by Casey’s manufacturing company, PCH International.
• Beijing to Halve Minimum Days Foreigners Could Stay in China: Xinhua-Caijing
  A draft proposal to amend China’s immigration laws is likely to cut the minimum period foreigners who are working in the country could stay in the country, from previous 180 days to 90 days
• As Western media contract, the China Daily expands – The Globe and Mail
  Then on Monday, this “tweet” from a China-based acquaintance travelling in Italy floated up my computer screen: “China Daily is the only English-language paper available at my hotel in Milan,” wrote Jeremy Webb, a well-known public relations consultant and blogger.
• China’s Internet IPO Prospects Are Bleak, But There’s Hope In Two Letters: M and A | PandoDaily
• China Responds to Slowdown With Reforms – WSJ.com
  China’s government has responded to a deep economic slowdown with a slew of policy initiatives in recent months that together underline a strategy to spur a recovery, while allowing market forces to play a bigger role in reforming an economy still dominated by the state.
• Banking Sector Sees Rise in Bad Loans – Caixin Online
  Wenzhou has witnessed a worrying resurgence of NPLs, which some fear could become a nationwide problem
• China’s 2012 growth target at risk, property curbs hurt | Reuters
  “I cannot see a bottom in economic growth. The general slowdown trend may not change anytime soon,” Shi Xiaomin, vice president of the China Society of Economic Reform, a government think-tank in Beijing, told Reuters.
• China forcing refugees back to Myanmar conflict zone: report | Reuters
  Chinese authorities are forcing back into Myanmar some of the ethnic Kachin refugees who have fled into China trying to escape civil war, and Beijing is denying basic care to many who remain, a human rights group said on Tuesday.
• 我国拟禁止地方政府举债 由国务院财政部门代发_新闻_腾讯网
• Collapsing U.S. credibility – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com
  a key reason China believes it can act with impunity when it comes to human rights?
• Maybe This Really Is China’s New Stealth Jet | Defense Tech
  If this veiled jet really is the F-60 (it could be another airplane or just a large mock up of the F-60), China might be on track to to reveal two new types of stealth fighters in less than two years.
• Hugo Restall: The Censor at Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post – WSJ.com
  Under Editor Wang Xiangwei, a once-revered source of China news started to pull its punches.
• Macau Casinos Decline on Visa, Credit Limit Concerns – Bloomberg
  Macau casino stocks declined in Hong Kong trading amid speculation visa restrictions and limits on some China credit cards are slowing revenue growth in the world’s largest gambling hub.
• Publicis Hit by Stagnant China Ads as Europe Crisis Spreads – Bloomberg
• China’s First Wind-Farm Lull Limits Outlook for Sinovel: Energy – Bloomberg
• China’s Stocks Drop for Fifth Day on Growth, Europe Debt Concern – Bloomberg
• Sotheby’s to Enter China’s Property Market By Mid-2013 on Wealth – Bloomberg
  The company will focus on the first-tier cities such as Beijing and Shanghai, Chief Executive Officer Michael Good of the New Jersey-based firm said. Sotheby’s real estate unit has affiliates in 45 countries and regions, including Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam in Asia.
• Where does soft power begin? – China Media Project
  But while keeping bad news under wraps is an obvious priority for Party and government leaders, something we’ve seen play out for decades in China, there have been slight changes to the tone of media control as well, particularly over the past three to five years.Leaders, particularly at the national level, seem far more sensitive now to the international impact of domestic stories than they have been in the past. And many seem to understand that in this age of rapid, decentralized sharing of information, it is difficult to separate domestic public opinion (and the project of information control) from the issues of foreign news coverage, China’s international image and — yes, here comes that magic word now so cherished by Chinese leaders — soft power.

• Forced abortion victim branded ‘traitor’ for talking to foreign media | Ministry of Tofu 豆腐部
  According to the post, after Deng Jiyuan, victim Feng Jianmei’s husband and father of the aborted fetus, was interviewed by German reporters, the local government was riled up about him exposing the skeleton in the cupboard, and sent people to stage a protest outside Deng’s home with huge red banners reading ‘Strike Down Traitors with Heavy Hands; Kick Them Out Of Zengjia Township.’ Deng was forced to flee his hometown.
• » Six Points on Social Insurance for Foreigners Rectified.name 正名
  Starting in July, my coworkers and I will be among the first foreign residents of China asked to contribute to the Chinese social insurance system. Although the law was promulgated last October at the national level, Tianjin, like most major cities, has been slow to implement it locally. In fact, according to people at my company’s headquarters in Shanghai, Suzhou is the only other city which has enforced the social insurance law for foreigners working at training centers like mine. For many foreigners working in Shanghai and Beijing the social insurance tax is still something on the horizon.
• Regulator Announces Crackdown on Media Bribery – Caixin Online
• 房地产调控已陷进退两难境地
  销售价与量的止跌或回升，都可能使这轮调控与前两次一样，无果而终 http://companies.caixin.com/2012-06-26/100404022.html (来自财新网客户端)
• China to link up housing market info systems｜Economy｜News｜WantChinaTimes.com
  been delayed repeatedly, surprised of it finally happens
• China Warns SOEs over Downturn for 3-5 Years-Caijing
• Business Insider–BofA’s Lu Ting Blasts New York Times Report About Fabricated Electricity/Power Data
  Now, Ting Lu, China economist for Bank of America Merrill Lynch, is out with a note in which he says while China’s slowdown has been worse than anticipated, and while “we” have also complained about data quality, “we have some very different views from what the NYT article claims”, which “stirred markets today”.
  Ting first questions the veracity of the Bradsher’s sources and some basic facts, saying he cited only one economist but later “extrapolated that to ‘Western economists’ and questions who this Western economist with ties to the NBS is. Moreover, he points to the part of the article that says “cities and provinces across the country had reported flat or only slightly rising electricity consumption”. And points out that in May Shanghai, Hubei and Jiangxi, officially reported negative YoY growth of power consumption.
  He then questions the logic
• The iPhone and upstart smartphone Xiaomi | Danwei
• US nuke sub docks at Subic – News – Manila Standard Today – Daily news, current events, latest news in the Philippines Sites site
  2nd one recently
• Mark Hibbs • China and DPRK Sanctions-Busting
  On Friday, June 29, the United Nations Security Council will release a report telling us about efforts by the DPRK to obtain weapons and WMD-related items in violation of UNSC sanctions. That’s interesting because, according to two Japanese press reports which appeared on June 22, this is the first time since 2010 that China–one of the countries fielding experts to a consulting body to the UNSC Sanctions Committee concerning the DPRK–has permitted the UNSC to release these documents.
• 党报刊文忆乔石 政法委被指有碍法治或被削权_多维新闻网
  interesting things seem to going on around attitudes to the politics and law committees

Digest powered by RSS Digest

Subscribe Now