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
- China Growth Slows Across All Fronts in July, Prompting Unexpected Rate Cut — Move comes after a month in which retail sales, property prices and youth unemployment worsened.
- U.S. Lawmakers Travel to Taiwan on Heels of Pelosi Visit — Congressional delegation to meet with Taiwan’s president, other top leaders; visit comes shortly after Beijing ended military drills around island.
- What a Chinese Blockade of Taiwan Would Mean for Global Business — Taiwan is home to TSMC, the world’s biggest chip maker, and sits next to one of the busiest shipping lanes.
- China Sets Joint Air-Force Training With Thailand — Drills follow Beijing’s live-fire exercises around Taiwan.
- China’s Xi Jinping Plans to Meet With Biden in First Foreign Trip in Nearly Three Years — The Chinese leader, who has remained at home during the pandemic, is organizing a visit to Southeast Asia, say people familiar with the matter.
- Opinion: Xi Jinping’s Reach Exceeds His Grasp — He wants nothing less than to see China become the pre-eminent global power during his lifetime. By Kevin Rudd
The Financial Times
- The semiconductor boom: has the UK missed its chance? — Geopolitical uncertainty hangs over a government rethink about how to protect the domestic chip industry at a time of economic nationalism.
- China cuts lending rate as economic data disappoint and Covid cases rise — Central bank intervenes as world’s second-biggest economy suffers lockdowns and property market malaise.
- China ratchets up pressure on Taiwan after US congressional visit — Fresh military manoeuvres announced following US lawmakers’ meeting with President Tsai Ing-wen.
- US and China hold separate military drills in south-east Asia — War games come after Beijing wraps up exercises around Taiwan in show of strength.
- Hong Kong accounting watchdog launches second probe into Evergrande and PwC — Investigation centres on $2bn loan scheme at subsidiary of indebted developer.
- Expat teachers balk at Hong Kong’s quarantine strictures — International schools struggle to hire staff despite offering attractive wage packages.
- Opinion: The Chips Act debate shows how far the Republicans have moved — Rebuilding America’s industrial base is superseding traditional economic doctrine. By Oren Cass
The New York Times
- How Frustration Over TikTok Has Mounted in Washington — National security concerns over the Chinese-owned viral video app remain unresolved. Lawmakers and regulators are increasingly pushing for action.
- Troops, Noodles and Familial Love: China Lays Out Its Ideal Taiwan — Beijing has seized on the tensions over Taiwan, further fanned by a meeting between five U.S. lawmakers and the island’s president, to push a far-reaching vision for unification.
- Five U.S. Lawmakers Arrive in Taiwan Amid Tensions With China — The delegation, led by Senator Ed Markey, Democrat of Massachusetts, is visiting less than two weeks after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit set off tensions with China.
Caixin
- Cover Story: The Challenges Ahead for China’s Digital Yuan — Achieving the second-by-second payment processing capacity needed to handle the massive volume of transactions in China’s economy will mean spending billions of yuan to build data centers and add servers and bandwidth, Caixin learned.
- China’s Youth Unemployment Rate Rises to Another Record — China’s urban youth unemployment rate reached 19.9% in July, the highest level since record keeping began in January 2018.
- Wuling-GM Venture Speeds Into Indonesia With New Electric Car — The relatively low prices will give the car a significant cost advantage over those produced by their bigger Japanese rivals.
South China Morning Post
- Chinese drone maker DJI asserts its products’ civilian use after Russian official calls them ‘symbol of modern warfare’ — Russia’s embassy in China has deleted a post in Weibo that praised DJI’s drones for bringing ‘a real revolution’ to traditional artillery weapons.
- China’s semiconductor output shrank 17 per cent in July as supply chains remained under pressure from strict Covid-19 policies — The weakness in chip production is a further setback for China’s ambition to boost local semiconductor production.
- Taiwan chip veteran calls working for China’s top foundry SMIC a ‘foolish’ decision — The industry veteran said his decision to join a mainland company tarnished his reputation in Taiwan, despite receiving the blessings of TSMC’s founder.
- Sequoia Capital China opens start-up accelerator despite tech crackdown, slowing economy — The venture capital firm plans to provide US$1 million in funding to each successful graduate of its inaugural six-week accelerator programme.
Nikkei Asia
- Anxious Chinese businesses, consumers cut borrowing after brief rebound — As private sector holds back, government accounts for over half of financing demand.
- Sri Lanka lets Chinese research ship dock amid security concerns — Yuan Wang 5 will now arrive Tuesday despite India’s suspicions.
Bloomberg
- Billionaire Behind Big Nickel Short Plans to Sell Steel Assets — Tsingshan in discussions with China’s state-owned Baowu.
- Alibaba, ByteDance Share Details of Prized Algorithms With Beijing for First Time — Firms from Tencent to ByteDance start by describing software.
- Now Elon Musk Is Telling China’s Censors About His Vision for the Future — Tesla Inc. chief Elon Musk has contributed a column for the official publication of the Cyberspace Administration of China, the powerful agency that oversees data security for companies from Alibaba to Tencent and works with other government organs to censor online content.
- China’s Airlines Could Join the Multibillion-Dollar Exit From US Stock Markets — China Southern Airlines, China Eastern pointed at by Saxo Bank.
Other Publications
- Associated Press: ‘China threat’ emerges in elections from UK to Australia — While inflation and recession fears weigh heavily on the minds of voters, another issue is popping up in political campaigns from the U.K. and Australia to the U.S. and beyond: the “China threat.”
- The Daily Telegraph: Chinese institutes at UK universities ‘screening out undesirable staff’ — Confucius Institutes may be in breach of law by accepting candidates whose political views and ethnicities were vetted in China.
- The Washington Post: In China, civil servant chic is the new look for straitened times — Long considered uninspired, the simple attire of the Chinese politician in recent months has gained new appeal for those who want the security of official jobs.
- Rest of World: “They need India more than India needs them”: Chinese brands that pioneered India’s smartphone market are now being hounded by authorities — As many as 119 bank accounts of Vivo India have been frozen, while Oppo India has been accused of avoiding taxes worth $551 million.
- The Globe and Mail: China has encroached on Canada’s critical minerals industry, with almost no obstruction from Ottawa — For the past two decades, China has built up a powerful position in Canada’s critical minerals and mining sector, with little oversight from Ottawa.
- China Media Project: Telling China’s Story, Poorly — Why did four Chinese propaganda documentaries of questionable quality and dubious provenance win awards at minor, as well as fake, international film festivals?
