Good Morning. Welcome to The Wire’s daily news roundup. Each day, our staff gathers the top China business, finance, and economics headlines from a selection of the world’s leading news organizations.
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The Wall Street Journal
- No Stranger to Failure, Founder of Sunac China Fights to Save His Property Empire — Sun Hongbin’s company is trying to avoid defaulting after missing a dollar-bond payment earlier this month.
- Chinese Markets Tank as Investors Worry About Covid-19 Lockdowns — Two widely watched Chinese stock indexes fall roughly 5%, Chinese yuan hits lowest level since November 2020.
- Covid-19 Cases Jump in Beijing as New Deaths Triple in Shanghai — China’s capital ramps up testing to halt outbreak; Hangzhou restricts movements in some parts of tech hub.
- Beijing Braces for Omicron Wave With Stockpiling, Testing — Shanghai, the center of the country’s most serious outbreak, reports 51 new deaths.
- TikTok Owner ByteDance Taps Senior Lawyer as CFO — Julie Gao, a senior China-focused lawyer, to join company as its top finance executive.
- Shanghai Lockdown Bolsters a Fringe Independence Movement — Resentment over handling of Covid-19 feeds a view that the city would be better off on its own. In New York, an activist has a flag ready.
The Financial Times
- Beijing gripped by panic buying as Covid cases rise — Supermarket shelves emptied after city officials order lockdown in several neighbourhoods.
- Shanghai fences off apartment building entrances to tighten lockdown — Harsh measures come as Chinese censors struggle to control viral video of city’s hardships.
- China’s Covid strictures scupper hopes of property revival — Beijing has implemented measures to boost the economy but data point to significant downturn.
- US steps up efforts to court Solomon Islands after China security deal — Washington accelerates embassy reopening in South Pacific nation after it agreed a pact with Beijing.
The New York Times
- China’s Covid Lockdowns Stir Memories of a Planned Economy — China is meddling with free enterprise as it hasn’t in decades. The results are familiar to those old enough to remember: scarcity, and the rise of black markets.
- Covid Outbreak in Beijing Prompts Panic Buying and Lockdown Fears — Supermarkets stocked up as long lines formed. The Chinese authorities ordered mass testing to contain a rising number of cases in an affluent district of the capital.
Caixin
- Cover Story: Shanghai’s Rocky Road to Rebooting — In its fourth week of a citywide Covid-19 lockdown, China’s financial, logistics and manufacturing giant Shanghai is struggling to get back on its feet.
- Cost of Sea Freight From China Continues to Fall Off Record High — Slackening overseas demand and domestic Covid outbreaks have pushed down prices from February’s peak.
South China Morning Post
- Alibaba CEO Daniel Zhang relinquishes corporate role at Taobao, Tmall as part of e-commerce giant’s management reshuffle — Earlier in January, Zhang resigned from the board of directors of Chinese microblogging service Weibo, days after he left the board of ride-hailing giant Didi Chuxing.
- The military race for low Earth orbit satellites – and why China is behind — Private companies are lining up in the West to fast and reliable LEO internet services for the defence sector.
- Didi’s Hong Kong listing hits snag as plan by China’s ride-hailing giant is on indefinite hold pending outcome of probes, sources say — Didi was notified that its relisting plan wouldn’t receive a green light until it makes sufficient ‘rectifications’ in accordance with probes conducted by regulators.
Nikkei Asia
- Teardown of China budget smartphone Honor reveals rise in US parts — Former Huawei brand relies heavily on Qualcomm and Micron components.
- India offers carrots to ‘pro-China’ neighbors Sri Lanka, Nepal — Political instability in South Asia opens diplomatic doors for New Delhi.
Bloomberg
- Hong Kong Foreign Journalists Club ‘Suspends’ Human Rights Award — Hong Kong’s storied Foreign Correspondents Club announced Monday that it would “suspend” its annual Human Rights Press Awards this year because of concerns about possibly violating the national security law imposed on the city by China in 2020.
- Xi’s Finance Crackdown Grows as Over 40 Officials Ensnared — President Xi Jinping’s corruption crackdown on the nation’s sprawling financial sector is accelerating, reaching the upper levels at some of China’s premier institutions and further unnerving investors having to contend with mounting headwinds for the world’s second-largest economy.
- Shanghai Pens in Residents in Renewed Effort to Stamp Out Covid — Shanghai is erecting metal barriers nearly a month into a city-wide shutdown, a reflection of how its Covid crisis is intensifying despite strict curbs that have kept millions of people locked in their homes for weeks.
Reuters
- ‘Shanghai was a lesson’: Beijing residents hit the stores amid COVID lockdown fears — A mass COVID-19 testing order in Beijing’s biggest district prompted residents in the Chinese capital to stock up on groceries, fearing they could be destined for a lockdown similar to that of Shanghai, which entered a fourth week of bitter isolation.
- Investors in the dark on China industrial transport as data curbs bite — Companies can no longer see how goods are moving in and out of the key port as a result of a recent data law that cracked down on data sharing.
- WTA not returning to China in 2022, wants resolution to Peng case — The WTA is still working to find a resolution to the standoff with China over the Peng Shuai issue but will not return to the country this year, Tour chief Steve Simon said.
Other Publications
- Associated Press: Shanghai erects metal barriers in fight against COVID-19 — Volunteers and government workers in Shanghai erected metal barriers in multiple districts to block off small streets and entrances to apartment complexes.
- Politico Magazine: How Far Does China’s Influence at U.S. Universities Go? One Student Tried to Find Out. — Peter Mattox had some worries about Chinese state control over NMSU’s Confucius Institute. So he designed an experiment. Here’s what happened.
- Foreign Affairs: The Biotech Battlefield — How to Contend With China’s Risky R&D. By Dov Fox
- MIT Technology Review: WeChat wants people to use its video platform. So they did, for digital protests. — A video protesting the Shanghai lockdown spread quickly on the app, as Chinese users raced to outwit censors and keep it alive.
