An underwhelming turnout for China’s grand import expo
There was a somewhat disappointing VIP turnout for the grand import fair hosted by Xí Jìnpíng 习近平 to showcase China’s open markets, reports Keith Bradsher for the New York Times (porous paywall). “Despite months of energetic efforts by China to persuade foreign leaders to attend, only about a dozen presidents and prime ministers — from Hungary, the Dominican Republic and El Salvador, among others — showed up Monday morning.” Many came from developing countries with a history of heavy borrowing from Beijing, while “notably absent were the leaders of major trading nations like Germany, Britain, South Korea and Japan.”
Will the auto industry’s center move to China? Oilprice.com says China “is already well established as the global leader for the batteries that power electric vehicles, which are seen as a vital component to the future of the automotive industry.”
The piece concludes that as electric vehicles begin to dominate the auto industry, Europe’s car manufacturing will “soon be making a mass move to China.”
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