US investments into China are dropping, shows the latest AmCham survey into the country’s business climate for US companies, reports the South China Morning Post March 2023. And while the number of US companies planning to move out of China is limited, one of the problems hindering investments is a growing reluctance among qualified experts to move to China, the paper reports. New investments have stalled and plans exist to decrease current investments.Read More →

While China is seriously trying to get to terms with the end of the zero-Covid policies since the end of December 2022, international business has not been following suit, according to the Financial Times. International business delegations and other foreign visitors have not yet returned to Shanghai, writes the paper.Read More →

A default of the US is highly unlikely, even in the current chaotic political setting in the United States, says leading China economist Arthur Kroeber, but today the risks for China are much higher than during the 2008-2009 crisis. A crisis would not offer an opportunity to build an international financial system around the Renminbi, next to the US dollar, he adds in the ChinaFile.Read More →

Russian-born China digital marketing guru Ashley Dudarenok has been spending much of her recent professional life in Hong Kong. In December she swapped her Russian passport for a Hong Kong one and became a real Hongkonger. In the South China Morning Post, she explains why.Read More →

Two hundred Chinese companies listed in the US thought they would get a pass when the PCAOB accepted late last year the auditing process for those companies. But financial analyst Winston Ma warns there are still significant uncertainties for those firms, as the SEC still indicates on its website those companies are still in danger of being delisted, he tells CNBC.Read More →

China veteran Ian Johnson, senior fellow for China studies at the Council on Foreign Relations think-tank, discusses at Channel News Asia how different China might treat much-discussed political issues like Taiwan after the visit of US House speaker Pelosi and possible new tracks in economic directions. The recent shift of focus towards the private sector as a key part of China’s economic growth strategy is more of a “tactical adjustment” instead of a change in the leadership’s thinking, said Mr. Johnson.Read More →

Strategic analyst Victor Shih, author of Coalitions of the Weak, (2022), looks at China’s sudden exit from its contested zero-Covid policy. Was it because of the protests, was it planned before, and what does it mean for the country’s domestic policies and economics? A discussion at the New Yorker on how decisions at the  top-level take place.Read More →

One of China’s leading health experts, Zhong Nanshan, expects China to return to normal after Covid-19 halfway 2023, according to AFP. After the surprise turnaround in early December from the zero-Covid policy, the country is now bracing for a dramatic upsurge in patients, both under quarantine at home and in the hospitals because the Omicron variant is highly transmissible but less mortal, he told state media on Sunday 11 December.Read More →

Now China suddenly started to retract its zero-Covid strategy, strategic analyst Ian Johnson looks back at how the country got itself into this unprecedented mess at the Prospect. The economic slowdown and high unemployment “are all underlying issues that actually make the government’s challenge greater than first appears,” says Ian Johnson.Read More →