380 « Week In China

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WiC 380 (Sep 15, 2017)

Society, Talking Point China’s crucial Party Congress meets next month – but how does…

When the Communist Party of China (CPC) held its first ‘national’ congress in the summer of 1921 it only had about 50 members. Some of them ...

Banking & Finance Famed “ghost town” now home to world’s largest Bitcoin miner

Ordos, a city in Inner Mongolia, grew in line with China’s thirst for coal. Now those plentiful pits have helped a new form of twenty-first century ...

Energy & Resources Citic threatens to shut its Australian iron ore mine over legal…

Citic Group owns Australia’s largest magnetite mine, producing the kind of higher-grade ores (62% Fe and above), which Chinese steel producers ...

Internet & Tech Facial recognition tools spread across China

From ale to jail – that is how the Guardian newspaper described it earlier this month when Chinese police used facial recognition technology to nab ...

Rise of the RMB Is China plotting the death of the petrodollar?

Struggling with inflation and a nasty balance of payments deficit, Richard Nixon shocked the world’s central banks in 1971 by closing the ‘gold ...

Energy & Resources China steps up shale gas industry’s development

It has a long way to go before it rivals the US, but China is starting to ramp up its shale gas production after a number of false starts. Last ...

China Consumer Why a hygiene shock at hotpot king Hai Di Lao isn’t…

In 2011 Huang Tieying, an academic, published a case study with the unpromising title “You can’t copy Hai Di Lao”. His point was that the ...

Banking & Finance Postal Saving Bank plans homecoming via A-share market

It has long been a case that the postman doesn’t knock twice for some of China’s regional and rural commercial banks. Nearly every single one ...

Banking & Finance, Belt and Road Legend buys Luxembourg’s oldest private bank

Throughout its history, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg has been subject to the push and pull of competing regional powers including the Dutch, Belgians, ...

Economy A Rmb1 trillion problem for Chinese banks

Dongbei Steel has been in difficulties for months – from the news of its initial bond defaults last year (see WiC319) through its challenges in ...

Society Pregnant woman’s suicide sparks outcry

Why is a woman’s consent not enough to allow a hospital to perform a C-section? That’s the question many Chinese are asking after Ma Rongrong, a ...

Entertainment Top actress reveals state secrets in novel approach to promoting her…

Even though The New York Times called the film “the best non-documentary American feature made yet about the war in Iraq,” the US military did not ...

Planet China Images of China’s latest rain gear for toddlers have gone viral…

Images of China’s latest rain gear for toddlers have gone viral in the past week. Sold on Taobao, the rain protectors have won plaudits for keeping ...

Sino-File “In the past two years, which have been our most difficult,…

Xiaomi founder Lei Jun quoted in the Financial Times, which described the tech firm as having gone from unicorn to “unicorpse” to Chinese phoenix. ...

Cartoons The boxer rebellion

The Olympic Games has been the springboard for boxing greats to emerge – think Muhammad Ali or Evander Holyfield. However, there are glaring ...

And Finally Cheesemakers chastened by import ban

At last week’s BRICS Summit President Xi Jinping promised not to “move anyone’s cheese” – a reference to Spencer Johnson’s motivational ...