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☆ China’s Exports Fall for Fourth Straight Month
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-06 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

A Reuters survey forecast that exports had fallen 9.2 percent in August from a year earlier, and that imports had dropped 9 percent. Many had stocked up on manufactured goods during the pandemic, often from China, which has by far the world’s largest factory sector. Why It MattersExport and import statistics provide one of the early indications each month of how the Chinese economy fared in the preceding month. The data released on Thursday was the latest sign that overall demand for China’s goods may have begun to bottom out. While China’s exports have been weak this year, they are coming down from a very high level achieved during the pandemic.

Persons: ”, Louise Loo Organizations: Reuters, Export, Oxford Economics, “ Locations: United States, China, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Singapore, Europe, Asia

☆ China Is Flooding the World With Cars
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-06 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

At a time when many of China’s exports are faltering and its consumers are spending less at home, the country is flooding the world with cars. Chinese automakers have leaped to dominance in Russia since war began in Ukraine, transporting cars by train. The companies have also captured large shares of markets in Southeast Asia, Australia, South America and Mexico. With lingering Trump-era tariffs holding back sales to the United States, China’s automakers are preparing a big push into Europe — once they have enough ships. Shipyards along the Yangtze River are building a fleet of car-carrying ships that act as giant floating parking lots, capable of carrying 5,000 or more cars at a time.

Persons: Europe — Organizations: Shipyards Locations: China, Russia, Ukraine, Southeast Asia, Australia, South America, Mexico, United States, Europe

President Biden had bet that high-level dialogue could help manage an escalating rivalry over trade, technology and the status of Taiwan. After logging all those miles, the question now is whether China will reciprocate by sending senior Chinese ministers to Washington. The United States has publicly invited China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi, but he has yet to accept. The last senior Chinese official to travel to Washington was China’s commerce minister, Wang Wentao, who visited in late May. China has much to gain from dispatching officials to the United States.

Persons: Gina Raimondo, Biden, Antony J, Blinken, Janet L, John Kerry, Wang Yi, Wang Wentao, China’s, Xi Jinping Organizations: Taiwan, United Locations: China, Beijing, Washington, United States, San Francisco

The Biden administration was willing to work to promote trade with China for many categories of goods. There is a long history of frustrating and unproductive economic dialogues between the United States and China, and there are not many reasons to believe this time will prove different. And Biden administration officials argue that even the shift to begin talking has been significant, after a particularly tense period. Relations between the United States and China became frosty last August when Representative Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker at the time, visited Taiwan, and they froze entirely after a Chinese surveillance balloon flew across the United States in February. Ms. Raimondo’s trip capped a summer of outreach by four senior Biden officials.

Persons: Biden, China’s, Ms, Raimondo, Nancy Pelosi, Nicholas Burns, “, ” Organizations: U.S ., Biden Locations: China, United States, U.S, Taiwan

He has broad oversight of economic policy, and has long been closely associated with Xi Jinping, China’s top leader. Seated in a red-carpeted reception room on the second floor of the Great Hall, Mr. He said at the start of their meeting that he was ready to work with Ms. Raimondo, and hoped the United States would adopt rational and practical policies. “The U.S.-China commercial relationship is one of the most globally consequential, and managing that relationship responsibly is critical to both our nations and indeed to the whole world,” Ms. Raimondo said. “And while we will never of course compromise in protecting our national security, I want to be clear that we do not seek to decouple or to hold China’s economy back.”

Persons: Gina Raimondo, Xi Jinping, Ms, Raimondo, Biden, ” Organizations: of Locations: United States, Beijing, U.S, China

High-ranking United States and Chinese officials held a series of economic policy meetings on Tuesday in Beijing, in the latest sign that both countries are trying to stop the long deterioration in their relationship and restore communications. Seated in a red-carpeted reception room on the second floor of the Great Hall, Mr. She responded that while the United States would not compromise on issues of national security, it also would not try to disconnect from China or hold back China’s economic development. He has broad oversight of economic policy as one of four vice premiers, and has also been closely associated with Xi Jinping, China’s top leader, since 1985. That was when the two men began collaborating on economic development as officials in Xiamen, a city in Fujian Province on the southeastern coast of China.

Persons: Gina Raimondo, Ms, Raimondo, Xi Jinping Organizations: of Locations: United States, Beijing, U.S, China, Xiamen, Fujian Province

The United States and China on Monday agreed to hold regular conversations about commercial issues and restrictions on access to advanced technology, the latest step this summer toward reducing tensions between the world’s two largest economies. The announcement came during a visit to Beijing by Gina Raimondo, the U.S. commerce secretary, who is meeting with senior Chinese officials in Beijing and Shanghai this week. The agreement to hold regular discussions is the latest move toward rebuilding frayed links between the two countries, a process that had already begun during three trips in the past 10 weeks by senior American officials: Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen and John Kerry, the president’s climate envoy. “I think it’s a very good sign that we agreed to concrete dialogue, and I would say, more than just kind of nebulous commitments to continue to talk, this is an official channel,” Ms. Raimondo said in an interview after four hours of negotiations with China’s commerce minister, Wang Wentao.

Persons: Gina Raimondo, Antony J, Blinken, Janet L, Yellen, John Kerry, “, Ms, Raimondo, Wang Wentao Locations: States, China, Beijing, U.S, Shanghai

Gina Raimondo, the secretary of commerce, who arrived in Beijing on Sunday, is the latest Biden administration emissary seeking to stabilize ties between the world’s two largest economies. The fourth senior U.S. official to travel to China in less than three months, Ms. Raimondo is taking her trip at a critical juncture. Relations between the countries are strained, partly because the United States has clamped down on China’s access to technology that could aid its military. Ms. Raimondo’s agenda is varied, including economic diplomacy, getting to know China’s new economic team and defending the interests of American companies and their employees. Ms. Raimondo’s department oversees the export controls and other restrictions that the Biden administration has put in place, many of which have angered Chinese officials and prompted retaliation.

Persons: Gina Raimondo, Biden, Raimondo Organizations: U.S Locations: Beijing, China, United States, U.S

☆ How China Made Its Housing Crisis Worse
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-24 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In China the pension akin to Social Security in the United States pays about $410 a month to seniors who live in cities, and only $25 a month in the countryside. China’s consumer safety net is full of holes, even when accounting for lower costs of living compared to the United States. Beijing policymakers, who have a longstanding aversion to financial protections for households, have begun trimming social spending this year. That could further harm the country’s already sputtering levels of consumer spending, in turn dragging property prices even lower. The World Bank and a Chinese government planning agency boldly made the point in 2012 with a report, titled “China 2030,” that called for China to support consumers better and embrace a “turning point in its development path.”

Organizations: Social Security, World Bank Locations: China, United States, U.S, Beijing

☆ Why It’s So Hard for China to Fix Its Real Estate Crisis
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-22 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The head of the central bank, fielding questions at a rare news conference, said that China would make it easier to get home mortgages. Vast sums were also lent to local governments, allowing them to splurge on new roads and rail lines. For China, it was a familiar response to economic trouble. Today, as China faces another period of deep economic uncertainty, policymakers are drawing on elements of its crisis playbook, but with little sign of the same results. It has become considerably harder for China to borrow and invest its way back to economic strength.

Persons: Zhou Xiaochuan Locations: China

☆ China Stocks and Currency Sink After Weak Response to Property Mess
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-21 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Stocks in China tumbled and the currency weakened on Monday after the country’s central bank announced a smaller-than-expected cut in a key interest rate. Many investors and economists had been expecting Beijing to act more decisively on interest rates as China faces falling apartment prices, weak consumer spending and broad debt troubles. The central bank, the People’s Bank of China, shaved only a tenth of a percentage point off the benchmark one-year interest rate used for most corporate loans, with no change at all in the five-year rate used for pricing mortgages. The slight reduction for one-year loans marked the second time in two months that the government has pushed down commercial banks’ lending rates. The modest scale of the cut on Monday was the latest sign that the government’s usual tools for addressing an economic slowdown may have lost some of their effectiveness, economists said.

Organizations: People’s Bank of China Locations: China, Beijing

China has effectively scuttled a $5.4 billion deal by Intel, the Silicon Valley semiconductor giant, in the latest sign of the frayed business ties between China and the United States. Intel, which has long had operations in China, said Wednesday that it had “mutually agreed” to terminate a planned merger with Tower Semiconductor, an Israeli chip manufacturer. The announcement came after China’s antitrust regulators failed to rule on the transaction before a deadline set by the companies. The planned merger, announced in February 2022, passed antitrust reviews in the United States and Europe. But it ran into a lengthy delay in China, where regulators review mergers of companies that earn a certain amount of revenue in the country.

Organizations: Intel, Tower Semiconductor Locations: China, United States, Europe

☆ China’s Economy Faces Yet Another Threat: Falling Prices
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-09 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The United States has spent much of the past 18 months struggling to control inflation. China is experiencing the opposite problem: People and businesses are not spending, pushing the economy to the verge of a pernicious condition called deflation. For 10 straight months, the wholesale prices generally paid by businesses to factories and other producers have been down from a year earlier. Deflation is particularly serious in a country with very high debt, like China. Overall debt is now larger in China, compared with national economic output, than in the United States.

Organizations: National Bureau of Statistics Locations: States, China, Japan, United States

☆ Anger Builds in Towns Deliberately Flooded, in Part, to Save Beijing
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-04 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

For days, the rain came down in sheets, pounding Beijing and areas around it in what the government said was the heaviest deluge China’s capital had seen since record keeping began 140 years ago. When the extreme downpour finally stopped on Tuesday, most of Beijing had been spared the worst — but partly because officials made sure the floodwaters went elsewhere. Officials in Hebei Province, which borders Beijing, had opened flood gates and spillways in seven low-lying flood control zones to prevent rivers and reservoirs from overflowing in Beijing and the region’s other metropolis, Tianjin, state media said. The Communist Party leader of Hebei, Ni Yuefeng, said he ordered the “activation of flood storage and diversion areas in an orderly manner, so as to reduce the pressure on Beijing’s flood control and resolutely build a ‘moat’ for the capital.”

Persons: Ni Yuefeng, ” Organizations: Communist Party Locations: Beijing, Hebei Province, Tianjin, Hebei, Ni

☆ China Is Trying to Make Its Gloomy Consumers Spend More
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-31 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Those were a few of a long list of measures detailed on Monday by the Chinese government in an effort to stimulate consumer spending. Li Chunlin, vice chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, acknowledged at a news conference that consumers are wary. “Some consumers lack confidence and have many concerns,” he said. Real estate prices have tumbled, leaving many Chinese feeling poorer and less willing to spend. Youth unemployment reached 21.3 percent in June, leaving them and their nervous parents more cautious about spending.

Persons: Li Chunlin, ” Organizations: National Development, Reform Locations: Beijing, Real

☆ China’s New Central Banker Once Fixed a Crisis. He May Need to Again.
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-25 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

For nearly eight years Pan Gongsheng has overseen one of the world’s biggest pots of money: China’s $3 trillion in foreign currency reserves. Now he will run the country’s central bank, playing an even more powerful role in the Chinese economy. Mr. Pan, a prominent economist, was named on Tuesday as governor of the central bank, the People’s Bank of China. The appointment of Mr. Pan comes at a delicate time for China. Foreign currency reserves are effectively a country’s emergency fund to be used at times of financial stress.

Persons: Pan Gongsheng, Pan, Mr Organizations: People’s Bank of China, bank’s Communist Party, Administration of Foreign Exchange Locations: China, bank’s

☆ Why Heat Waves Are Deepening China’s Addiction to Coal
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-20 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

China has an answer to the heat waves now affecting much of the Northern Hemisphere: burn more coal to maintain a stable electricity supply for air-conditioning. Last month, China generated 14 percent more electricity than it did in June 2022, and the whole increase was generated by coal-fired plants. China’s ability to ramp up coal usage in recent weeks is the result of a huge national campaign over the past two years to expand coal mines and build more coal-fired power plants. State media celebrated the industriousness of the 1,000 workers who toiled without vacations this spring to finish one of the world’s largest coal-fired power plants in southeastern China in time for summer. Yet for reasons of energy security and domestic politics, it is doubling down on coal.

Organizations: Northern Locations: China, United States, Europe, Japan

Mr. Kerry emerged late Wednesday from the lengthy negotiations in Beijing with no new agreements. In fact, the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, insisted in a speech that China would pursue its goals to phase out carbon dioxide pollution at its own pace and in its own way. Still, Mr. Kerry appeared buoyed that the world’s two biggest polluters had restarted discussions, which had been frozen for a year because of strained relations over Taiwan, trade and other issues. He insisted he was not disappointed in the outcome, noting that just talking marked progress. “We had very frank conversations but we came here to break new ground,” Mr. Kerry said, adding, “It is clear that we are going to need a little more work.”

Persons: John Kerry, Biden’s, Kerry, Xi Jinping, Mr, ” Locations: Beijing, China, Taiwan

☆ One Reason China Is Willing to Engage Again: Its Troubled Economy
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-17 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Still, analysts noted that any softening in approach remained limited to economic or business policies that do not involve China’s national security, which has become a defining feature of Chinese policy in recent years. On Saturday China announced that it would hold joint naval and air force exercises with the Russian military in the Sea of Japan. And Mr. Xi himself gave a speech on July 6 urging the military to “break new ground” in war preparedness, warning that “China’s security situation is facing rising instability and uncertainty,” according to the official Xinhua news agency. China has also taken steps this month that could undermine its reputation as a reliable link in global supply chains. It said it would limit exports of rare materials needed to make semiconductors, in a step widely seen as retaliation for American limits on the sale of advanced semiconductors to China.

Persons: “, ”, Scott Kennedy, Xi Jinping, Xi Organizations: Center for Strategic, International Studies, Saturday China, Xinhua Locations: Washington, China, United States, Japan

☆ China’s Rebound Falters, Tripped Up by Debt and Weak Exports
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-16 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +5 min

China’s economy is flashing many warning signs. Weak spending is pushing China close to a dangerous trend known as deflation: Consumer prices are flat, and wholesale prices paid by companies are actually falling. “It’s not a strong recovery; the economy is quite weak,” said Wang Dan, the chief economist at Hang Seng Bank China. Some companies are also moving supply chains out of China, which will have a longer-lasting effect on exports, Mr. Fattal said. But a huge accumulation of debt, particularly at the level of local governments, has made that hard to do.

Persons: ”, Diana Choyleva, “ It’s, Wang Dan, Richard Fattal, Fattal, Lou Jiwei, Cui Dongshu, Fu Linghui, Lou, Ms, Wang, Li You Organizations: Enodo, National Bureau, Statistics, Investment, Hang Seng Bank China, National Bureau of Statistics, Administration, Customs, Companies, Workers, China, China Passenger Car Association Locations: Shanghai, London, China, Baoding, United States, Europe

After three years of self-isolation by China, President Biden’s top aides are flying into Beijing throughout the summer to try to convince and cajole Chinese officials, including Xi Jinping, the nation’s leader, on building a new foundation for relations. It could amount to the most consequential diplomatic push of Mr. Biden’s presidency. He is betting that high-level dialogue can itself act as a ballast in a relationship that has been in a dangerous free fall for years. director and the secretary of state have also traveled to Beijing, and the special climate envoy and the commerce secretary are following soon. Mr. Biden and his aides say forging these personal ties could be necessary for defusing crises between the world’s two main superpowers.

Persons: Biden’s, Xi Jinping, “, ” Mr, Biden, Janet L, Yellen, Mr, Xi Organizations: CNN Locations: China, Beijing

After 10 hours of meetings over two days in Beijing, Ms. Yellen said at a news conference on Sunday that she believed the United States and China were on a steadier footing despite their “significant disagreements.”“We believe that the world is big enough for both of our countries to thrive,” Ms. Yellen said. And later this month, John Kerry, the special presidential envoy for climate change, will visit China to restart global warming negotiations. Yet a meaningful easing of the economic tension may not be likely. Ms. Yellen headed back to Washington on Sunday with no announcements of breakthroughs or agreements to mend the persistent fissures between the two nations. And Ms. Yellen made clear that the Biden administration has serious concerns about many of China’s commercial practices, including its treatment of foreign companies, and policies that the United States views as efforts at economic coercion.

Persons: Janet L, Yellen, ”, Ms, Antony J, John Kerry, Biden Locations: China, United States, Ukraine, U.S, Beijing, Washington

☆ 3 Takeaways From Janet Yellen’s Trip to Beijing
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-09 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Ms. Yellen used softer language for America’s economic strategy toward China, disavowing a term that had caught on in Washington but offended Beijing. Yet even though more talks are a likely outcome of Ms. Yellen’s trip to China, neither she nor Chinese officials retreated from their policy positions. She forged ties with China’s economic leaders. The officials — including Ms. Yellen’s counterpart, Vice Premier He Lifeng — generally have less international experience than their predecessors and are less familiar to policymakers in the West. One of Ms. Yellen’s top goals was to meet China’s new team.

Persons: Janet L, Yellen, Xi Jinping, Lifeng Organizations: China’s Communist Party Locations: United States, China, Beijing, Washington, West . China

☆ Why China Has a Giant Pile of Debt
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-08 | by ( Keith Bradsher | More About Keith Bradsher | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

That is at least in part because China is facing a debt bomb at home: trillions of dollars owed by local governments, their mostly off-the-books financial affiliates, and real estate developers. But China’s state-controlled banking system is wary of accepting losses on foreign loans when it faces far greater losses on loans within China. How much debt does China have? Researchers at JPMorgan Chase calculated last month that overall debt within China — including households, companies and the government — had reached 282 percent of the country’s annual economic output. What distinguishes China from most other countries is how fast that debt has accumulated relative to the size of its economy.

Persons: Janet L, Yellen, — Organizations: JPMorgan Chase Locations: China, Beijing, United States, Japan

The Biden administration called on China on Saturday to do more to help developing countries combat climate change, urging the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases to back international climate finance funds that it has so far declined to support. Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen delivered the message during her second day of meetings in Beijing, where she is seeking to cultivate areas of cooperation between the United States and China. Ms. Yellen said that China, like the United States, has a responsibility to be a climate finance leader. “Climate finance should be targeted efficiently and effectively,” Ms. Yellen said during a meeting with a group of Chinese and international sustainable finance experts on Saturday morning. “I believe that if China were to support existing multilateral climate institutions like the Green Climate Fund and the Climate Investment Funds alongside us and other donor governments, we could have a greater impact than we do today.”

Persons: Janet L, Yellen, ” Ms, “, ” Organizations: Biden, Climate Fund, Climate Locations: China, Beijing, United States

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