Last year was the Year of the Rabbit for the Chinese – promising among other things good luck! However, China which came out of the global financial crisis almost unscathed (or at least better off than most major world economies) hit one too many ‘speed-bumps’ in 2011. Last year’s inflation is threatening a significant slow-down […]
Last month Secretary of State Hillary Clinton proclaimed, in an article for the Foreign Policy Magazine, ‘America’s Pacific Century’! This week, President Obama will be laying the foundation through a series of multilateral meetings involving Pacific Rim countries. He will start with the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting in Hawaii (Nov 12th-13th), and continue at […]
Global economic developments this year, along with the impact of safe-haven investment flows have led to the appreciation of the dollar in global markets, contributed to the high level of unemployment in the U.S. and increased the chances for a double-dip recession in America. All these developments have further highlighted the international tensions over exchange […]
It is a well know fact that China undervalues its currency, by pegging the renminbi (RMB) to the dollar at an artificially low level. This, along with other subsidies and mercantilist trade policies, keeps Chinese exports cheap, and thus more attractive to consumers in the U.S. and Europe. Because China is the manufacturing hub for […]
A lot has been said by the major Western news sources (WSJ, Bloomberg, FT, NY Times) about China’s reaction to the downgrade of the U.S. creditworthiness. Although there has been no official comment from Beijing since the downgrade, the Xinhua news agency (the official mouth-piece and the usual government ‘attack dog’ for criticizing the U.S.) […]
In this multi-polar world we live in, cooperation among the top three world powers (U.S., China, EU – see my previous post on ‘Triangle World Order’) will be paramount in fixing global problems like the global economic recession, climate change, nuclear proliferation, and now the developments in North Africa and the Middle East. Such efforts […]
Firstly, an update to my previous post concerning Chinese Cyber-Espionage attacks on the U.S. and other developed nations. AP national writer, Pauline Arrillaga, did a much broader write-up on the issue, here. It is definitely worth a look-see. ———————————————————————————————————– On to the Other China, Taiwan – Current Taiwanese President, Ma Ying-Jeou (Mă Yīngjiŭ: 马英九) of […]
U.S. experts and politicians are starting to hone into the ‘dangers’ of R&D and technology transfers to China, as the most serious long-term threat to the U.S. economy and national security. U.S. comparative advantage (innovation and new technologies) is being undermined by outsourcing of manufacturing to China, the relocation of R&D facilities to Chinese tech-parks, […]
I recently came across an interesting paper at Brookings by Wang Feng, The Future of a Demographic Overachiever: Long-Term Implications of the Demographic Transition in China. The title of the paper is self-explanatory as to the subject. Through his research, Wang found a consistent continual demographic decline in China. This is not necessarily news, but […]
In an update to the previous post, Russia is already accusing China of trying to fix market prices for the new Skovorodino-Daqing. That’s very shocking, I know. Business Insider posted an article stating that the Russian government owned pipeline company Transneft is not only accusing the Chinese National Petroleum Company (CNPC) of violating the terms […]
In the last installment of the two part “Trading with the Enemy” Series, this blog looked a serious issues of contention affecting Sino-American trade-relations, cyber-espionage and hacking. Now we will examine a little discussed area of discomfort, trade between China and it’s very large northern neighbor, Russia. Over the last two decades, the Sino-Russo “Cold […]
China has over 400 million internet users, more than any other nation. This exponentially increasing population of Chinese netizens entering the global internet community has not come without serious negative externality. Over the past decade, there has been a marked increase in cyber-espionage and hacking coming from Mainland China. Espionage is not new, even between […]
Once again, inflation increased in China last month by more than economists expected, as rising commodity costs and inflows of capital threaten to overheat economies across Asia. China’s consumer prices rose 5.4% from a year earlier, the fastest pace since 2008, according to statistical reports coming out of China. Four interest-rate increases in China since […]
A new study by The Economic Strategy Institute (ESI), commissioned by the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, called “The Evolving Role of China in International Institutions”, takes a thorough look into China’s growing influence in international organizations. The report contains two truisms, ten trends, seven recommendations, and a number of case studies on China’s […]
Something I ran across on the ‘net that I wanted to share with readers. The video below was originally posted by Aljazeera in September of 2010: The past decade has seen Chinese economic growth explode across the world and the Chinese economic miracle seems to reach into every imaginable area of manufacturing and natural resources. […]