1. FT: Ex-president Jiang urges Beijing to curb anti-corruption drive
Jiang Zemin, the former Chinese president, has urged the current leadership to rein in the toughest anti-corruption campaign in decades, which is threatening the interests of some Communist party elders. Mr Jiang, who stepped down as president of China in 2003 but retained control of the military for a further two years, has sent a clear signal in the past month to Xi Jinping, the president, according to three people familiar with the matter. Mr Jiang sent a message saying “the footprint of this anti-corruption campaign cannot get too big” in a warning to Mr Xi not to take on too many of the powerful families or patronage networks at the top of the party hierarchy. Former President Hu Jintao, who was replaced by Mr Xi a year ago, has also expressed reservations about the anti-corruption drive and warned his successor not to expand it too far, according to one person involved in executing the campaign.
FT Back to Top
2. NYT: Leader of China aims at military with graft case
Prosecutors accused a former senior military official on Monday with a litany of criminal charges, including bribery, embezzlement and abuse of power, presenting a first glimpse of what could be the biggest corruption scandal to ever engulf the Chinese armed forces. The charges against the officer, Lt.
Gen.
Gu Junshan, are the outcome of a far-reaching inquiry under President Xi Jinping that signaled his determination to make high-profile examples out of dishonest military figures. His goal, military analysts said, is to transform a service larded with pet projects and patronage networks into a leaner fighting force more adept at projecting power abroad and buttressing party rule at home, and to tighten his own control over the army.
NYT Back to Top
3. WSJ: Chinese dragnet entangles family of former security chief, Zhou Yongkang
Authorities detain associates of former head of China National Petroleum in
corruption investigation.
WSJ Back to Top
4. NYT: Chinese billionaire’s trial scrutinized for links to ex-official
Judges began hearing arguments on Monday in the closely watched murder and corruption trial of Liu Han, a powerful billionaire from western China accused of running a criminal network to build his fortune. Political analysts say the trial is an outgrowth of efforts to investigate an even more powerful target — Zhou Yongkang, a former Politburo Standing Committee member who ran China’s sprawling domestic security apparatus for a decade, until his retirement in 2012. Mr. Zhou was also a senior figure in the oil industry and from 1999 to 2002 was party chief in Sichuan Province, where Mr. Liu lived and made his fortune through mining, real estate and other industries.
NYT Back to Top
5. WSJ: Chinese military files charges against former general
Case seen as test of China's determination to confront alleged corruption.
WSJ Back to Top
6. Reuters: China charges former senior military officer with graft: Xinhua
China has charged former senior army officer
Gu Junshan with corruption, state news agency Xinhua said, in what is likely to be the country's worst military scandal since a vice admiral was jailed for life for embezzlement in 2006. In a renewed campaign on graft, Chinese President Xi Jinping has vowed to go after both powerful "tigers" and lowly "flies", warning that the issue is so severe it threatens the ruling Communist Party's survival.
Gu has been charged with corruption, taking bribes, misuse of public funds and abuse of power, Xinhua said on one of its official
microblogs on Monday. He will be tried by a military court, it added.
Reuters Back to Top
7. Bloomberg: China manufacturing index little changed in March
Chinese manufacturing indexes pointed to weakness in the world’s second-biggest economy as leaders contemplate whether to add stimulus. A Purchasing Managers’ Index fell to 48.0 in March, the lowest reading since July, from 48.5, HSBC Holdings
Plc and Markit Economics said today. A separate PMI from the government, with a larger sample size, was at 50.3 after 50.2 in February. The reports underscore what Premier Li Keqiang last week called “difficulties and risks” in the world’s second-largest economy as he tries to control surging debt and pollution shrouding cities across China. Li said the nation has policies in reserve to support growth after the cabinet said it would accelerate construction spending.
Bloomberg photo.
Bloomberg Back to Top
8. FT: Factory output points to stabilisation in Chinese economy
Chinese factory activity remained steady in March, suggesting that the economy has
stabilised and easing pressure on the government to prop up growth. The official purchasing managers’ index for manufacturing, a survey that is seen as a leading indicator for industrial growth, edged up to 50.3 from 50.2 in February. A reading above the 50 mark signals an expansion of activity, so factory growth appears to have improved moderately in month-on-month terms. “This is the first time since November that the PMI has risen, indicating that our country’s manufacturing sector is steady overall and trending in a positive direction,” the national statistics bureau said. The Chinese economy has been sluggish out of the gate this year, as tighter credit weighs on investment, property sales weaken and the government’s anti-corruption campaign takes a toll on consumption. Fears of a deeper slide have
fuelled calls for Beijing to deploy a stimulus-style push to keep the economy on track, but the resilient PMI makes such intervention less urgent.
FT Back to Top
9. WSJ: For deal makers, China is a drag
For deal makers, China has emerged as a great wall to vault. Major global mergers are being held up by several months because China's antitrust authority has a relatively small staff and an unusually broad mandate that includes weighing a deal's impact on domestic economic development, antitrust experts say. The delays, along with some of the remedies required to overcome the agency's concerns, are prompting deal advisers to try to minimize Beijing's impact or—where possible—bypass its review altogether, they say. China has yet to give the green light to the $35 billion merger of advertising giants Publicis Groupe SA and Omnicom Group Inc., or to Microsoft Corp.'s €5.4 billion ($7.5 billion) acquisition of Nokia Corp.'s handset business, months after both deals were approved by antitrust authorities in the U.S.
and the European Union. That is despite the fact that the Publicis-Omnicom merger, announced last July, was expected by analysts to face the most scrutiny in the Americas, where its share of the media-spending market will top 40%, according to French research group RECMA. "We got 14 of the 15 jurisdictions' agreement
…we are waiting for the Chinese," Maurice Levy, chairman and chief executive of Publicis, said at a conference in London last week.
WSJ Back to Top
10. Reuters: Hundreds protest chemical plant in southern China
Hundreds of protesters in southern China marched against a chemical plant and environmental degradation on Sunday in a demonstration that the Maoming city government called a "grave violation" by criminals causing chaos. Photos posted on Weibo, China's Twitter-like microblog service, showed hundreds of demonstrators marching along the streets, an overturned car in flames and protesters laying bloodied on the road. Others showed lines of paramilitary police marching in formation. The images of violence - which could not be independently verified by Reuters - caused an outcry on Chinese social media, although many were later removed from the site by censors. Residents of Maoming, in Guangdong province, were protesting the production of
paraxylene, a chemical used to make fabrics and plastic bottles at a plant run by the local government and state-owned Sinopec Corp, China's biggest refiner.
Reuters Back to Top
11. WP: U.S. cyberwarfare force to grow significantly, defense secretary says
The Pentagon is significantly growing the ranks of its
cyberwarfare unit in an effort to deter and defend against foreign attacks on crucial U.S.
networks, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Friday. In his first major speech on cyber policy, Hagel sought to project
strength but also to tame perceptions of the United States as an aggressor in computer warfare, stressing that the government “does not seek to militarize cyberspace.” His remarks, delivered at the retirement ceremony of Gen. Keith Alexander, the outgoing director of the National Security Agency and Cyber Command, come in advance of Hagel’s trip to China next week, his first as defense secretary. The issues of
cyberwarfare and cyber-espionage have been persistent sources of tensions between Washington and Beijing.
WP Back to Top
We are starting to hear a lot about a bilateral investment treaty (BIT) with China. Here’s hoping we hear a lot more. The United States and China restarted BIT negotiations last summer when China agreed to include key equal treatment principles advocated by the US-China Business Council and others. The United States already has an open investment environment and we see the benefits on a daily basis. Foreign investment, including investment from China, creates American jobs, increases local tax revenues, and boosts our overall economic growth. A BIT with China wouldn’t change the rules in the United States. Chinese companies will still be required to adhere to US law; we will still have a review process in place to make sure US national security is not harmed by Chinese (or other foreign) investment. However a BIT with China would change the rules for US companies in China. China maintains ownership restrictions on American and other foreign companies in about 100 sectors, including manufacturing, services, energy, and agriculture. American ownership in auto plants is limited to 50 percent. Life insurance 50 percent. Cloud computing 50 percent. Soybean oil (used in kitchens in every Chinese home) 49 percent. The list goes on. BIT negotiations with China should be a high priority for the Obama administration. Let’s see if China is willing and able to move forward with opening its economy to American companies. If not, we can focus on other things. But if so, we have an opportunity to change the rules of the relationship with China that would address a set of increasingly troublesome and outdated market access barriers for American companies looking to stay strong in the global economy. That’s why an investment treaty with China matters.
13. CD: We should join hands, Xi tells EU
China and the European Union should be partners for growth, offering each other opportunities and speeding up completion of an investment treaty, President Xi Jinping told European Council President Herman Van Rompuy on Monday. In the first visit to EU headquarters by a Chinese president, Xi told the bloc's top official that China expects Europe to expand high-tech exports, and that the two sides should start a feasibility study for a free trade pact as soon as possible. Xi, on the last leg of his first official tour of Europe, met with Van Rompuy, European Parliament chief Martin Schulz and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso. Xi said China firmly supports European integration and has committed itself to expanding and deepening a comprehensive strategic partnership with the EU. He proposed that the two sides take the lead in following a course of peaceful development by intensifying consultations and coordination on international and regional affairs to push for the political settlement of "hot" issues. As reform in China and the EU has entered "deep-water" zones, the two sides should share
experience and step up cooperation on such reform priorities as the
macroeconomy, social governance, public policies, rural development, employment and environmental protection. Van Rompuy said the Chinese president's presence at the EU headquarters is testimony that the EU-China comprehensive strategic partnership is on a firm footing.
CD Back to Top
14. Xinhua: China attaches high importance to IPR: vice premier
Chinese Vice Premier Wang Yang said on Monday that China will continue to place great importance on intellectual property rights protection. Wang made the remarks while meeting with Wendell P. Weeks, chairman and chief executive officer of Corning Incorporated, a large manufacturer of specialty glass and ceramics. In 2011, Corning Inc.
accused China's Hebei Dongxu Investment Group Ltd.
of stealing secrets used in the production of glass for computers,
smartphone and television displays. Corning filed suit July 18, 2011 against the company in the Beijing Second Intermediate People's Court. On November 15, 2013, Corning and Dongxu amicably resolved their dispute. Corning licensed to Dongxu technology and Dongxu paid Corning fees to make Gen 6 and below
flat panel display glass on the Chinese mainland. Wang said the concord between the two companies
was a model for properly resolving trade disputes between enterprises of two countries. He said the Chinese government will try to create better conditions for fair competition and developing an innovation-based economy. Wang hoped that Corning Inc.
would work with its Chinese partners to expand their win-win cooperation.
Xinhua Back to Top
15. Caixin: Provinces seeking fewer civil servants this year, official data shows
Local governments are heeding the advice of Premier Li Keqiang and cutting back on payroll spending, expert at Peking University says.
Caixin Back to Top
16. Reuters: China's Xi wins EU pledge to consider free-trade deal
Chinese President Xi Jinping won a promise from the European Union on Monday to consider a multi-billion-dollar free-trade deal with his country, a long-held goal for Beijing which divides Europe. Xi, the first Chinese leader to visit the EU institutions in Brussels since ties were established in 1975, pressed senior EU officials to consider such a pact, despite European concerns that Chinese state-owned firms flout international trade rules. The 28-nation EU committed for the first time to opening talks on a free-trade accord (FTA) if current negotiations on an "investment agreement" to improve business ties are successful. "Concluding such a comprehensive EU-China Investment Agreement
... will convey both sides' joint commitment towards stronger cooperation as well as their willingness to envisage broader
ambitions including, once the conditions are right, towards a deep and comprehensive FTA, as a longer-term perspective," the two sides said in their summit statement.
Reuters Back to Top
17. Bloomberg: China milk thirst hands U.S. dairies record 2014 profits
In a year when most American farmers can expect lower earnings than in 2013, U.S.
milk producers are having a windfall. Prices have never been higher, feed costs are down, and
output is headed for an all-time high as exports surge to buyers from Mexico to China. While the average farm will see a 21 percent drop in net-cash income, led by declines for corn, wheat and soybeans, dairy farmers will earn 28 percent more at $334,100, the U.S.
Department of Agriculture predicts. “Dairy farmers are making the best money they’ve made in many, many years,” said Peter Gutierrez, vice president of global ingredient sales for Agri-Mark Inc., a 1,200-member dairy cooperative in Methuen, Massachusetts, that makes Cabot Creamery cheese and sells about 120 million pounds annually.
Bloomberg Back to Top
18. WSJ: China's New Wager: Pulling energy from the ocean
Lengthy coastline, pollution
make country a prime testing ground in joint ventures with western firms.
WSJ Back to Top
19. FT - Russ Koesterich: Reports of death of EM are exaggerated
Volatility is par for the course with emerging markets.
FT Back to Top
20. Guardian: How Reader's Digest became a Chinese stooge
Reader's Digest is alleged to have censored stories in its publication to maintain a cheap publishing deal in China.
Guardian Back to Top
