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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. Have Chinese real estate stocks become a bargain? It is a question that comes up every time the sector starts staging a rebound. The result is volatility. For developers’ shares to swing over 20 per cent in a day is no longer unusual. Even stocks like China Vanke, once the most safe and stable of the country’s builders, move dramatically on nothing more than a few hints of policy support.…

Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free Your guide to what Trump’s second term means for Washington, business and the world On the grounds of never interrupting your enemy while he is making a mistake, Xi Jinping is 2025’s winner. The year’s hinge moment was Donald Trump’s cave-in to Xi in South Korea in late October. Trump’s trade war climbdown marked a new epoch. After mulling decoupling for years, talk of US-China divorce was suspended. Even so-called de-risking is now in question. Trump awarded their meeting a 12 out…

Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free Your guide to what Trump’s second term means for Washington, business and the world The writer is President Trump’s senior counsellor for trade and manufacturing Mexico’s decision last week to impose tariffs of up to 50 per cent on a wide swath of Chinese and other Asian imports is more than a neighbourhood scuffle. It is a major milestone in President Trump’s trade revolution — and in the postwar international trading system itself.  Now, one of America’s closest trading partners is openly…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. The writer is a senior fellow of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Europe is often portrayed as the great underperformer of the global economy, undermined by economic rigidity, high wages and an expansive social welfare system. For years critics have argued that these features must be reversed because they erode Europe’s competitiveness, pushing manufacturing activity towards more “nimble” economies that suppress wages, weaken labour protections, subsidise manufacturing and maintain…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. The writer is a senior fellow of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Europe is often portrayed as the great underperformer of the global economy, undermined by economic rigidity, high wages and an expansive social welfare system. For years critics have argued that these features must be reversed because they erode Europe’s competitiveness, pushing manufacturing activity towards more “nimble” economies that suppress wages, weaken labour protections, subsidise manufacturing and maintain…

Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free Your guide to what Trump’s second term means for Washington, business and the world The writer is President Trump’s senior counsellor for trade and manufacturing Mexico’s decision last week to impose tariffs of up to 50 per cent on a wide swath of Chinese and other Asian imports is more than a neighbourhood scuffle. It is a major milestone in President Trump’s trade revolution — and in the postwar international trading system itself.  Now, one of America’s closest trading partners is openly…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. Shares in Chinese makers of batteries, transformers and other equipment vital for the global build-out of artificial intelligence have rocketed this year, as power-hungry data centres rush to secure alternatives to overstretched legacy grids. Profits at Chinese companies such as CATL, the world’s largest battery maker, and Sungrow, the world’s second-largest supplier of integrated energy storage systems after Tesla, have soared on the back of domestic and foreign demand. CATL’s…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. Autonomous driving might be a race, but the world’s biggest automotive markets are speeding in different directions. In the US, self-driving cars are viewed as a software platform opportunity. Meanwhile, in China they are mostly being seen as a hardware-intensive mobility service. The recent listings of Pony.ai and WeRide in Hong Kong and the optimistic expectations and valuations attached to Waymo’s and Uber’s ambitions illustrate the divide. Undoubtedly, a large…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. Roomba maker iRobot has filed for bankruptcy and will be taken over by its Chinese supplier, marking the end of a company that popularised the robot vacuum cleaner but fell under the weight of competition from cheaper rivals. The US-listed group on Sunday said it had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in Delaware as part of a restructuring agreement with Shenzhen-based Picea Robotics, its lender and primary supplier, which will…