Monthly Archives: November 2007
Financial Expansion
The steady movement overseas of Chinese financial institutions continues with Ping An Insurance taking a 4.2% stake in Fortis, the Belgo-Dutch group, for $2.7 billion. China Life, Ping An’s larger rival, said earlier this week it planned to buy a … Continue reading
Filed under China-E.U., China-U.S., Economy, Markets
The World’s Most Middling Places To Live
China is a middling sort of place to live, but getting a bit better, according to the newly released annual U.N. Human Development Index. popularly known as its Best Places To Live list. China is listed as 81st out of … Continue reading
Filed under Economy, Environment, Politics & Society
Peeved Peter, Icy Yi
Peter Mandelson, the E.U.’s Trade Commissioner, touched a couple of raw nerves in his speech at the opening of a two-day international food-safety forum in Beijing on Monday: product safety and counterfeiting, saying that China, can’t solve the problems of … Continue reading
Filed under China-E.U., Economy, Product Safety
Sarkozy Super Salesman
Areva, the French nuclear power plant builder, has at least got is contract to construct two third-generation pressurized water reactors in Guangdong. Signing the $11.9 billion contract had been expected in July or August, but it has had to wait … Continue reading
Filed under China-E.U., Environment, Markets, Politics & Society
Steeling For A Takeover Fight
The unsourced report in China Business, here via AFX, that China’s newly launched sovereign wealth fund, China Investment Co., and a number of steel firms, including China’s biggest, Shanghai-based Baosteel, will bid $200 billion for U.K.-based Rio Tinto hits two … Continue reading
Car Talk
This Bystander is amused by the news that Beijing is exhorting government officials to abstain from using four-wheel drive vehicles and other gas-guzzling cars, and to take more public transport in order to lower emissions and protect the environment. Not … Continue reading
Filed under Environment, Politics & Society
Shanghai Bears
The Shanghai and Shenzhen stock markets are now approaching a level 20% below their peak in mid-October. Such a fall in a year is the rule of thumb for a market in a developed country to be called a bear … Continue reading
China’s Dollar Dilemma
China is in a currency bind. The slump in the dollar against currencies like the euro, sterling and the Canadian dollar is reducing the value of China’s $1.4 trillion of foreign exchange reserves, which are largely held in dollar denominated … Continue reading
Filed under China-U.S., Economy, Markets
Clamping Down On The Banks
Intriguing story in the Economic Observer, as reported by the AP, that China National Petroleum Corp and Sinopec are under investigation for being clients through subsidiaries of an illegal bank in Shenzhen. Both companies have refused to comment on the … Continue reading
Filed under Economy
The Wrong Blame Game
You’d never believe it from reading American newspapers, but toys made in countries other than China have a higher safety recall rate than those made in China. That is the finding of a study for the Asia Pacific Foundation of … Continue reading
Filed under Product Safety
