Taiwan has reported renewed Chinese military activity including nine aircraft crossing the sensitive median line of the Taiwan Strait and warships carrying out “combat readiness patrols”. Democratically governed Taiwan, which China claims as its own territory, has complained for the past four years of regular Chinese military patrols and drills near the island, as Beijing seeks to pressure Taipei over its sovereignty claims. With the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, in San Francisco last week for the Apec summit, where he met the US president, Joe Biden, such military activity around…
Day: November 18, 2023
Chinese policy banks shut out green energy despite President Xi Jinping’s 2021 pledge to developing countries, study says
Between 2000 and 2022, Chinese DFIs, including CDB and China Eximbank, provided 331 loans totalling US$225 billion, for 65 foreign governments for energy projects around the world, according to the China’s Global Energy Finance Database, managed by the Boston University policy centre. From 2016 onwards, China’s DFIs distributed 87 loans, valued at US$75.7 billion to 25 public borrowers within the energy sector. The amount surpasses energy sector lending offered to public entities by any other global lender and significantly outpaces the cumulative energy sector lending by the World Bank during…
Singapore family office applicants face 18-month wait amid tighter scrutiny
Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. The global queue to set up a family office in Singapore has stretched to as long as 18 months, with a backlog of wealthy investors encountering stricter new regulations in the Asian financial hub. Family offices, demand for which boomed during the pandemic and which have come to symbolise Singapore’s ambitions as an investment destination, have come under additional scrutiny in the wake of the city-state’s biggest money laundering probe.…
Cross-strait tensions no hurdle for Taiwanese shoppers – if the price is right
Taiwanese consumers like Hsu often buy gear from mainland China when prices are low and device efficacy is sufficient to satisfy their needs, a quality widely described as cost-performance value, or just “CP value”. If not, politics may intrude. “Even though there are some geopolitical tensions, consumers in Taiwan still buy made-in-China products as long as they are of high cost-performance value,” said Hu Jin-li, a professor with the Institute of Business and Management at Taipei’s National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University. Staff at a Taipei Oppo store explain new…
‘We were not hard enough’: how past trade tensions inspired Brussels’ fresh China crackdown
The EU has learnt its lesson on China, according to former European trade commissioner Karel De Gucht. The bloc is ramping up pressure on Beijing over its ballooning bilateral trade deficit, and, De Gucht said, its policy must be influenced by the outcome of a previous bout of trade tensions. Back in 2013, De Gucht was investigating alleged Chinese subsidies for solar panel production. The Belgian commissioner was dining with his wife when he got a call from his then-boss, European Commission president José Manuel Barroso. “I just had [then-Chinese…
Japan embraces management buyouts as pressures mount at listed groups
Stay informed with free updates Simply sign up to the Japanese business & finance myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox. Management buyouts in Japan have accelerated to their fastest pace in more than a decade as shareholder activism, intensifying governance pressure and a still open window of cheap financing trigger an exodus from public markets. A flurry of buyout announcements this month — involving companies in the education, basic materials and karaoke industries — are fuelling predictions by global and domestic private equity firms that MBOs could become…
Abandon the ‘China threat’ talk or risk upset in China-US reset, former Beijing envoy says
“Being number one is not the most important issue.” 03:12 Xi Jinping, Joe Biden hold talks on sidelines of Apec summit to ease strained US-China ties Xi Jinping, Joe Biden hold talks on sidelines of Apec summit to ease strained US-China ties Kong gave his assessment at a forum organised by the Academy of Contemporary China and World Studies, the China Public Diplomacy Association and the Beijing Club for International Dialogue. He said the meeting in San Francisco was “encouraging”, and analysts and the media should focus less on “hegemonies”…
China’s broadcasting regulator to increase control over country’s booming short web drama market
China’s broadcasting regulator is looking to tighten control over the growing short web drama market – including a sweeping review of each series’ cast, production, marketing and social values – several months after more than 25,300 such online shows were pulled because of violent, pornographic or vulgar content. The National Radio and Television Administration (NRTA) said it would take measures to “strengthen and refine management” of these short online dramas, according to a statement published on Wednesday via WeChat by the China Netcasting Services Association, a trade body under the…
Xi Jinping warns top officials to contain political risks to avoid China’s economy, society being hit by ‘butterfly effect’
Chinese President Xi Jinping has warned top cadres to get ahead of political risks, saying a “butterfly effect” could turn small threats into big dangers. Xi conveyed the message to senior officials at an internal meeting in February, but the comments were only made public earlier this month in a book released by Central Party Literature Press. “Now, various risks and dangers are highly correlated, strongly linked and rapidly transmitted. A little carelessness can cause a butterfly effect,” Xi told hundreds of senior officials at the meeting on February 7.…
Canada’s Michael Spavor blames fellow prisoner Michael Kovrig for China arrest
One of two Canadians imprisoned in China for nearly three years said his fellow inmate shared intelligence on North Korea with Canada and allied spy services, which was a factor in their arrests, according to a report by the Globe and Mail. More than two years after his return to Canada, Michael Spavor is seeking millions of dollars from the Canadian government as compensation, the newspaper said, citing information from people it did not name. Chinese authorities arrested Spavor and former diplomat Michael Kovrig in December 2018 in what was…