The International Monetary Fund’s revised World Economic Outlook is sobering. It is rare for the organisation to revise down sharply its projections for economic growth only one quarter into the calendar year. Yet in this case, it has done so for 86% of its 190 member countries, resulting in a decline of almost one percentage point in global growth for 2022 – from 4.4% to 3.6%. Moreover, this forecast is accompanied by a significant increase in projected inflation, and all this bad news is packaged in a wrapping of deeper…
Tag: International trade
China’s trade with Russia up by 12% in March from a year earlier
China’s trade with Russia jumped by more than 12% in March from a year earlier, outpacing the increase in Beijing’s trade with the rest of the world, according to Chinese customs data. Shipments to and from Russia increased 12.76% in March to $11.67bn, Chinese customs data showed on Wednesday, slowing from 25.7% growth in February, when Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine. The decline in trade with Russia was less severe than the decline with other countries, fuelling concerns that China has maintained strong links with Moscow despite the atrocities…
Could Putin be exploring cryptocurrencies to bypass western sanctions?
As many people do when discussing the complex world of cryptocurrencies, Vladimir Putin kept it simple: “Of course, we also have certain competitive advantages here, especially in the so-called mining.” After events this weekend, when Russia was hit by severe financial sanctions, the Russian president might be considering capitalising on those advantages. Putin was speaking in January, days after the country’s central bank proposed a blanket ban on cryptocurrency trading and mining. In the case of bitcoin, the cornerstone cryptocurrency, mining is the energy-intensive process by which computers verify new…
‘No light at the end of the tunnel’: Americans join Hong Kong’s business exodus
In July 2018, Tara Joseph, president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong, wrote an article in the best-known local English-language newspaper, the South China Morning Post, stressing to Americans the territory’s unique position as an Asian business hub. “The US is forgetting the differences between Hong Kong and China. Let’s remind them,” she wrote. “Hong Kong continues to have a robust and hearty infrastructure of values, practices and institutions that could not contrast more starkly with those of the mainland system.” Now, packing up and leaving the…
Taiwan ‘buys 20,400 bottles of Lithuanian rum rejected by China’
Taiwan’s government is sharing cocktail recipes with the public after it reportedly bought 20,400 bottles of Lithuanian rum bound for China amid a row between Vilnius and Beijing. The state-owned Taiwan Tobacco and Liquor (TTL) said it made the purchase in December to support Lithuania after learning the shipment was going to be blocked by Chinese authorities. “TTL stood up at the right time, purchased the rum and brought it to Taiwan,” the company said in a statement reported by the South China Morning Post. “Lithuania supports us and we…
From economic miracle to mirage – will China’s GDP ever overtake the US?
“The east is rising, the west is declining”, according to the narrative propagated by the Chinese Communist party (CCP). Many outside China take its “inevitable rise” as read. On the way to becoming a “modern socialist country” by 2035, and rich, powerful, and dominant by 2049, the centenary of the People’s Republic, China wants to claim bragging rights as its GDP surpasses the United States, and project its power based on its expanding economic heft. There is, however, a critical flaw in this narrative. China’s economy may fail to overtake…