Day: August 11, 2025

Lithium producer stocks surge after battery maker CATL suspends Chinese mine

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Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. The world’s largest battery maker CATL said it was suspending operations at a lithium mine in China, sending shares of other producers soaring on speculation that Beijing is moving to tackle industrial overproduction. Analysts said the suspension of the mine in Jiangxi province could be an early sign of how China plans to address overcapacity in industries ranging from solar panels to lithium, a vital metal in batteries for electric…

China property: Shanghai, Shenzhen could follow Beijing by dropping buying curbs

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Beijing’s surprise move to lift home-purchase restrictions in outlying areas will help stabilise housing prices in the capital by next year, according to analysts, who added that other major cities like Shanghai and Shenzhen could follow suit. Advertisement The municipal government said on Friday that families with Beijing residency, as well as those who paid social insurance and individual income tax in the city for a set period, would be allowed to buy new and second-hand homes outside the Fifth Ring Road, a major highway encircling the suburbs. The policy…

Trump urges China to buy more US soyabeans as trade truce deadline looms

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Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free Your guide to what Trump’s second term means for Washington, business and the world Donald Trump has called on China to quadruple its imports of American soyabeans to reduce its trade surplus with the US, a day before a crucial truce between the two countries is due to expire. The US president’s comments address one of the key political pressure points for Washington in its trade war with Beijing — the negative impact of high Chinese tariffs on US farmers who see…

Trump calls on China to quadruple US soyabean imports

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Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free Your guide to what Trump’s second term means for Washington, business and the world Donald Trump has called on China to quadruple its imports of American soyabeans to reduce its trade surplus with the US, a day before a crucial truce between the two countries is due to expire. The US president’s comments address one of the key political pressure points for Washington in its trade war with Beijing — the negative impact of high Chinese tariffs on US farmers who see…

Global uncertainties drive Chinese rush to African goldfields, despite the risks

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Chinese companies and miners in Africa are facing severe security threats from armed groups in search of gold, driven by soaring global prices for the precious metal. Advertisement Multiple attacks and kidnappings targeting gold miners have been reported from Ghana, the Central African Republic, Mali and the Democratic Republic of Congo in recent months. In Mali – one of Africa’s top gold producers – the Chinese embassy has repeatedly warned its citizens against operating gold mines in the country because of the worsening security situation. The embassy’s most recent advisory,…

‘I don’t expect to live a normal life’: how a Leeds teenager woke up with a Chinese bounty on her head

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It was Christmas Eve 2024 and 19-year-old Chloe Cheung was lying in bed at home in Leeds when she found out the Chinese authorities had put a bounty on her head. As she scrolled through Instagram looking at festive songs, a stream of messages from old school friends started coming into her phone. Look at the news, they told her. Media outlets across east Asia were reporting that Cheung, who had just finished her A-levels, had been declared a threat to national security by officials in Hong Kong. There was…

Voice of doubt in Nvidia’s H20 chips grows louder in China

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US chip giant Nvidia faces increasing mistrust in China over its H20 chips, after the company secured a licence from Washington to export the tailor-made processors by agreeing to pay 15 per cent of its revenues to the US government. Advertisement On Sunday, a Chinese state media outlet labelled Nvidia’s H20 chip as unsafe and urged Chinese buyers to boycott the artificial intelligence processors designed for the Chinese market. Despite Nvidia’s repeated denials of “back-door” vulnerabilities, Yuyuan Tantian, associated with state broadcaster China Central Television, said the H20 chip could…

The new widow-maker

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Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. For three long decades, shorting Japanese government bonds was the go-to way for gaijin fund managers to lose their clients’ money and their own reputations. Hence the hard-to-shift moniker for the trade being the ultimate “widow-maker”. After all, the logic of the trade looked infallible. For an entire generation, Japanese government debt-to-GDP spiralled ever higher: Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings. Meanwhile, GDP growth…