Cosun bond default unnerves investors

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• A default in China spreads anxiety among investors / WSJ (paywall)
  The failure of the Chinese phone maker Cosun Group to repay around $166 million in debts to private investors highlights challenges in China’s loosely regulated internet finance industry, where “hundreds of millions of people seeking higher returns on their savings have used their mobile phones to buy risky, unregulated investments.” The default is also an embarrassment to Alibaba Group because the corporate bonds were sold through its affiliate Ant Financial Services Group. In December, about 13,000 Ant Financial customers were affected by Cosun’s initial default of $45 million, but “the financial firm hasn’t said how many more were buyers of the much larger portion that defaulted” this time.
• Chinese giant buys U.S. firm that does Mexico money transfers / CNN
  Yesterday, we linked to a story about Alibaba affiliate Ant Financial acquiring the U.S. money-transfer company MoneyGram for about $880 million. Today, CNN says the deal “could be one of the first tests of how serious President Donald Trump is about cracking down on money transfers…to Mexico” because MoneyGram has a “thriving remittances business” and just last October signed a deal with Walmart to allow customers to send money from American Walmart stores to Walmart Mexico locations.

• China’s answer to Tesla is hopeful entrant to global car market / NYT (paywall)
• Apple iPhone toppled from No. 1 spot in China for the first time in 5 years making firm ‘vulnerable’: Research / CNBC
• Why China’s ‘creative way’ to fight capital outflows won’t be sustainable / Bloomberg
• Ancient Silk Road revival plans could be the new risk to Chinese banks / CNBC
• China is launching drones to fight back against earthquakes / Wired