Gloom deepens for China property developers

Gloom deepens for China property developers

May 9, 2014 11:44amby James Kynge

The torrent of bad news for Chinese property developers shows no sign of letting up.

Unsold floor space continued to surge in April. Two small developers are reported to be slipping into financial distress. The total net profits of 117 domestically-listed developers posted a 27 per cent decline in the first quarter to Rmb9.65bn. The bearishness of investment bank analysts, meanwhile, is plumbing new depths. Read more of this post

Can Stand-Up Comedy Succeed in China? Some of the country’s top comics are experimenting with a new brand of edgy, boundary-testing humor

Can Stand-Up Comedy Succeed in China?

Some of the country’s top comics are experimenting with a new brand of edgy, boundary-testing humor.

ROBERT FOYLE HUNWICKMAY 6 2014, 4:01 PM ET

Comedian Mark Rowswell, a.k.a. Dashan, performs at a Chinese university. Joe Wong in his weekly CCTV comedy show, Is It True?  Read more of this post

China’s $50 Billion Asia Bank Snubs Japan, India

China’s $50 Billion Asia Bank Snubs Japan, India

By Bloomberg News – May 12, 2014

On the first evening of the Asian Development Bank’s annual meeting in the capital of Kazakhstan this month, delegates from 16 countries skipped the scheduled Romeo and Juliet ballet for dinner at the Great Wall restaurant to talk about forming a totally different lender. Read more of this post

Unemployment ‘tidal wave’ feared in next two years in Australia

Unemployment ‘tidal wave’ feared in next two years

May 9, 2014

Bianca Hartge-Hazelman

Some analysts say the better-than-expected jobs data does not paint an accurate picture of the labour market. Photo: Louise Kennerley Read more of this post

Cheap buses lure travelers from rails, sky with new frills

Cheap buses lure travelers from rails, sky with new frills

Sun, May 11 2014

By Ian Simpson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Forget the grimy terminals and uncomfortable buses of the past. Discount U.S. carriers are luring a new generation of riders from young tourists to business travelers with amenities such as free Internet and leather seats. Read more of this post

Xi Says China Must Adapt to ‘New Normal’ of Slower Growth

Xi Says China Must Adapt to ‘New Normal’ of Slower Growth

By Bloomberg News – May 11, 2014

Chinese President Xi Jinping said the nation needs to adapt to a “new normal” in the pace of economic growth and remain “cool-minded” amid a slowdown that analysts forecast will lead to the weakest expansion since 1990. Read more of this post

Maple, resting on laurels: Canada has not learned every crisis lesson

Maple, resting on laurels: Canada has not learned every crisis lesson

May 3rd 2014 | Ottawa | From the print edition

CANADA weathered the financial crisis well. No bank needed to be rescued: the World Economic Forum anointed Canada’s banking system the soundest in the world. Mark Carney was exported to the Bank of England in large part because of his work at the Bank of Canada. Stephen Harper, the prime minister, took to describing Jim Flaherty, who died on April 10th just weeks after leaving the cabinet, as “the best finance minister on the planet”.

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The Communist Party: The gatekeepers; A string of arrests sparks debate about the role of leaders’ all-powerful assistants

The Communist Party: The gatekeepers; A string of arrests sparks debate about the role of leaders’ all-powerful assistants

May 10th 2014 | BEIJING | From the print edition

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China’s provincial economies: Unhappy convergence; Poorer provinces are suffering most as the economy slows

Provincial economies: Unhappy convergence; Poorer provinces are suffering most as the economy slows

May 10th 2014 | HONG KONG | From the print edition

CHINA’S economy is slowing: GDP grew by 7.4% in the first three months of this year, compared with 7.7% in the final quarter of 2013. Just one of 31 provinces hit its growth target. The pain is being felt most keenly in the underdeveloped if resource-rich west and south-west of the country; Yunnan saw the biggest drop in growth of any province.

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Italian banks: Neither borrowers nor lenders; Weak banks are squeezing the life out of the Italian economy

Italian banks: Neither borrowers nor lenders;  Weak banks are squeezing the life out of the Italian economy

May 10th 2014 | MILAN | From the print edition

“I’M SCARED to ask the banks for help,” says Alessandro Amati, the boss of Axel Elettronica, an Italian electronics firm. “It doesn’t seem they want to help concretely, just words.” The complaint is a common one among Italian businesses about a banking system that, on paper at least, ought to be one of Europe’s soundest. Total bank assets in Italy stand at a relatively modest 2.6 times GDP, compared with 3.2 times in the whole of the euro area. Italian banks generally shunned the sorts of toxic financial instruments that brought down banks in America and Germany. And the country has not experienced a housing bust on a par with that in Ireland or Spain.

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Shadow banking in China: Battling the darkness; Every time regulators curb one form of non-bank lending, another begins to grow

Shadow banking in China: Battling the darkness; Every time regulators curb one form of non-bank lending, another begins to grow

May 10th 2014 | JINGJIANG | From the print edition

IN THE town of Jingjiang, a few hours’ drive from Shanghai, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding is making 21 huge container ships for Seaspan, a Canadian shipping firm. An enormous sign declares, “We want to be the best shipyard in China.” It is certainly among the most profitable, earning 3 billion yuan ($481m) last year. But only two-thirds or so of that came from building ships. The rest came from lending money to other companies using a local financial instrument called an entrusted loan. This puts Yangzijiang at the forefront of another industry: shadow banking. Read more of this post

Daydream believers: Korean unification is less likely to be gradual and peaceful than nasty, brutish and quick

Daydream believers: Korean unification is less likely to be gradual and peaceful than nasty, brutish and quick

May 3rd 2014 | From the print edition

THIS seems an odd time for South Korea’s leaders to be talking up the prospects of reunification with their country’s evil twin. The economic gap between the rich south and dirt-poor north of the peninsula grows ever wider, implying mounting reabsorption costs for South Korea. And under its latest Kim-despot, the 30-ish, callow but ruthless Kim Jong Un, the North seems as hostile as ever, threatening new nuclear and missile tests and this week conducting live-fire exercises near the disputed maritime border. In response to Barack Obama’s visit to Seoul in late April an official “Peaceful Reunification” committee thundered that the North “must settle its final scores with the US through an all-out nuclear showdown”. And misogynistic bile was spat at the South’s president, Park Geun-hye: a “dirty comfort woman for the US and despicable prostitute selling off the nation”. Read more of this post

Eurotunnel: The next 20 years; A bad project comes good—with better yet in store

Eurotunnel: The next 20 years; A bad project comes good—with better yet in store

May 10th 2014 | PARIS | From the print edition

QUEEN ELIZABETH gamely saluted “la combinaison de l’élan français et du pragmatisme britannique”. President François Mitterand countered with a courteous nod to Britain’s help in two world wars. A centuries-old dream of connecting Britain to France was formally realised on May 6th 1994 with the opening of Eurotunnel under the English Channel, la Manche. Read more of this post

Corporate whistleblowers: Lawyer’s poker; In-house counsels’ lips might no longer be sealed

Corporate whistleblowers: Lawyer’s poker; In-house counsels’ lips might no longer be sealed

May 10th 2014 | NEW YORK | From the print edition

THE potential rewards of exposing corporate wrongdoing have ballooned in America, where whistleblowers can now claim up to 30% of fines imposed. Bent executives can be forgiven for feeling that the only insider they can trust not to spill the beans is the company lawyer, bound as he is by strict ethics rules and the principle of “attorney-client privilege”. Read more of this post

Electricity supply: Profitable interruptions; Collecting and trading spare electricity is a thriving industry

Electricity supply: Profitable interruptions; Collecting and trading spare electricity is a thriving industry

May 10th 2014 | From the print edition

SPIKES in demand for power and unexpected dips in supply have plagued electricity generators and their customers for decades. The solutions have been crude. More than a decade ago North American power companies started paying big consumers to switch off machines and devices to ease the load on creaking grids. In 2003 French producers did the same to cope with a heatwave. Read more of this post

How better rice could save lives: A second green revolution; Technological breakthroughs in rice will boost harvests and cut poverty. They deserve support

How better rice could save lives: A second green revolution; Technological breakthroughs in rice will boost harvests and cut poverty. They deserve support

May 10th 2014 | From the print edition

WHEN, in 1961, the government of India asked a celebrated wheat breeder, Norman Borlaug, for advice about new seeds, the subcontinent was thought to be on the verge of starvation. China actually was suffering from famine. Borlaug persuaded India to plant a new semi-dwarf variety of wheat in Punjab. The next year, the country also tried out a dwarf variety of rice called IR8. These short-stemmed crops solved a basic problem: old-fashioned crops were long and leggy, so when fed with fertiliser they grew too tall and fell over. Borlaug’s varieties put out more, heavier seeds instead. They caught on like smartphones. Over the next 40 years the green revolution spread round the world, helping ensure that, where its seeds were planted, famines became things of the past. Read more of this post