Month: March 2026

PDD Holdings, the Chinese e-commerce group behind Pinduoduo and global budget marketplace Temu, on Wednesday reported an 11 per cent drop in quarterly profit amid higher sales as the company continued a pivot towards greater reinvestment. Net profit for the quarter fell to 24.5 billion yuan (US$3.6 billion), missing a consensus analyst estimate of 29.1 billion yuan. Meanwhile, revenue rose 12 per cent from a year earlier to 123.9 billion yuan, aligning with a consensus analyst estimate of 123.7… South China Morning Post

For much of the post-war era, the architecture of global governance rested on the simple assumption that the United States would support the systems it largely designed and uphold the rules it helped to create. The first Trump administration was no isolated incident. Now, from the vantage point of 2026, amid the US-Israel attack on Iran and the subsequent closing of the Strait of Hormuz, it is quite clear that there is little sign of an appetite in Washington for the US to once again safeguard… South China Morning Post

China has officially designated ciyuan as the translation for “token” – the computational units that power tools such as Claude, ChatGPT and Gemini – in a move widely seen as devising a new form of global currency for the age of artificial intelligence. In Chinese, ci translates to “word”, while yuan is commonly used as a synonym for “currency”. For instance, the basic unit of the Chinese renminbi is the yuan, and most foreign currencies are referred to as yuan in Chinese, prefixed by their… South China Morning Post

Tan Ruisong, the former boss of China’s top military aviation company, has been given a suspended death sentence for reaping over 613 million yuan (US$89 million) from bribes and insider trading. Tan, 64, was the chairman and Communist Party secretary of state-owned Aviation Industry Corp of China (AVIC) – China’s leading military aircraft maker – from 2018 until his retirement in March 2023. He is one of the most prominent defence sector executives to come under investigation in President Xi Jinping’s sweeping anti-corruption campaign, which has cut a swathe through…

The Iran war has cut off a fifth of global oil and LNG supply, handing African producers “a structural advantage” in supplying global markets, although their capacity is hampered by factors beyond the Middle East conflict, according to analysts. “West and North African exports are largely insulated from the conflict, meaning barrels from Nigeria, Angola, Gabon, Algeria and Libya are viewed as lower-risk alternatives,” said Grace Goodrich and Anne-Laure Klein of Energy, Capital & Power, a Cape… South China Morning Post

China and the United States are trying to navigate their differences to ensure that they maintain a basic level of stability in their relationship, an academic conference in Beijing heard last week. At the forum held by Tsinghua University in Beijing on Friday, academics and former officials discussed the need to prevent open confrontation. US President Donald Trump’s planned visit – now postponed for “five or six weeks” as he focuses on his war with Iran – was seen as a key opportunity by many… South China Morning Post

Almost 80 per cent of the Chinese companies operating in the European Union plan to expand their investment there, even though most complain about policy uncertainty, according to a report published on Tuesday by the Chinese Chamber of Commerce to the EU (CCCEU) and the China Economic Information Service. The result stands in sharp contrast to similar reports published by the European Chamber of Commerce in China (EUCCC) – despite companies from both sides complaining about obstacles such as… South China Morning Post

Tokyo police have identified the 23-year-old suspect as Kodai Murata, a second lieutenant with the Ground Self-Defence Force (SDF), and said he was suspected of bringing an 18cm (7-inch) knife onto the embassy premises. No one was injured in the incident and a blade was found in shrubbery on the embassy grounds, Japanese public broadcaster NHK reported. Advertisement Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara told a press conference the incident was “truly regrettable”, adding: “The police are investigating the case and have increased the number of officers assigned to guard…