Links for Monday, July 6, 2020

BUSINESS AND TECHNOLOGY:

• Mainland’s top chipmaker readies IPO
  SMIC doubles size of Shanghai listing to $7.5 billion / Caixin (paywall)
  “The Chinese mainland’s top chipmaker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC) plans to raise as much as 53.2 billion yuan ($7.5 billion) in its upcoming Shanghai listing, which is poised to be the mainland’s biggest share sale in a decade.”
  China’s semiconductor contender isn’t holding that many chips / WSJ (paywall)
  “China’s leading domestic chip maker is minting cash in the stock market. Winning the global technological race will be much more challenging.”
  SMIC’s stock offering set to be China’s largest in a decade / Bloomberg (porous paywall)
• Missing trade deal targets
  China is unlikely to meet purchase targets for U.S. energy / WSJ (paywall)
  “Economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic has cast doubt on whether China can meet its targets to buy U.S. goods under this year’s trade deal—with energy emerging as the biggest casualty.”
• France’s Huawei compromise
  France won’t ban but will discourage use of Huawei 5G equipment, official says / Caixin (paywall)
  “France will not impose an outright ban on Huawei’s 5G equipment, but will avoid complete dependence on the Chinese company’s technology, the head of the French cybersecurity agency ANSSI has said.”
• Trump aims to recoup manufacturing
  Trump preparing orders on China and manufacturing, top aide Says / Bloomberg (porous paywall)
  Chief of staff Mark Meadows said in an interview with Fox News, “We’ve got a number of executive orders… We’re looking at how we make sure that China is addressed, how we bring manufacturing back from overseas to make sure the American worker is supported.”
• Sichuan coal miner forced into bankruptcy
  Leading Sichuan coal miner pulled into bankruptcy / Caixin (paywall)

Oversupply in China’s coal industry for the last eight years has prompted Beijing to launch a campaign to weed out many of the nation’s smaller, less efficient collieries. While those smaller companies have felt the brunt of the pain, the larger, state-owned Sichuan Coal Industry Group Ltd. Liability Co. joined their ranks last month when a provincial court in the capital city of Chengdu sided with the company’s creditors in forcing the miner into bankruptcy reorganization.

• The collapsing trust industry
  Anxin Trust’s $7 billion investment black hole / Caixin (paywall)
  “The collapse of Anxin brought to light a dark corner of China’s 20 trillion yuan ($2.8 trillion) trust industry where billions of dollars of investments were misappropriated to benefit the biggest shareholders and their affiliates.”
• China’s PPE stranglehold
  China dominates P.P.E. manufacturing / NYT (porous paywall)
  “Alarmed at China’s stranglehold over supplies of masks, gowns, test kits and other front-line weapons for battling the coronavirus, countries around the world have set up their own factories to cope with this pandemic and outbreaks of the future.”
• JD.com’s fintech IPO
  JD.com fintech affiliate plans STAR market IPO / Caixin (paywall)
  “JD.com Inc.’s fintech affiliate is planning a listing on Shanghai’s STAR Market later this year that will value it at up to 200 billion yuan ($28.3 billion)…”

SCIENCE, HEALTH, AND THE ENVIRONMENT:

• WHO updates its early COVID timeline
  WHO revises coronavirus timeline to clarify its China office raised alert, not authorities / AFP via SCMP
  The new timeline:

…indicates that it was the WHO office in China that notified its regional point of contact on December 31 of a case of “viral pneumonia” after finding a declaration for the media on a Wuhan health commission website. On the same day, the WHO’s epidemic information service picked up another news report – from US-based international epidemiological surveillance network ProMed – about the same group of cases from unknown causes in Wuhan.

Following these reports, the WHO asked Chinese authorities twice, on January 1 and 2, for information about these cases, which was provided on January 3.

• The bubonic plague strikes Inner Mongolia
  Bubonic plague case sparks health alert in North China / Caixin (paywall)
  “A city in North China’s Inner Mongolia autonomous region issued a health warning Sunday after a livestock herder contracted bubonic plague.”
  Bubonic plague found in a herder in Inner Mongolia, China says / NYT (porous paywall)
  City in Inner Mongolia raises alert over Bubonic Plague case / Sixth Tone
• The end of the mega dam era
  China’s mega-dams are giving way to cheaper renewable energy / Bloomberg via Al Jazeera

Engineers have run out of the easiest locations to power massive sets of turbines and the falling cost of rival energy sources such as solar mean it isn’t worth moving on to more challenging locations.

“It’s so cheap developing renewables and coal-fired power, why bother injecting huge sums of money to develop hydro 2,000 kilometers deep in the Tibetan plateau,” said Frank Yu, an analyst with Wood Mackenzie Ltd. “The future of hydro is going to be pumped storage and is also going to be smaller and smaller.”

• Are swine flu fears overblown?
  China says G4 swine flu virus not new; does not infect humans easily / Reuters
  “China’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs said on Saturday that the so-called ‘G4’ strain of swine flu virus is not new and does not infect or sicken humans and animals easily, rebuffing a study published earlier this week.”
• German drugmaker taps Chinese talent
  German drugmaker BI launches Shanghai center to harness Chinese expertise / Caixin (paywall)
  “German pharmaceutical firm Boehringer Ingelheim (BI) has launched its External Innovation Hub in Shanghai in a bid to harness China’s expertise in life science innovation to power its global drug discovery and development chain.”
• Fraudulent research
  Chinese research papers raise doubts, fueling global questions about scientific integrity / WSJ (porous paywall)
  “Internationally peer-reviewed journals published more than 100 scientific research papers from China-based authors that appear to have reused identical sets of images, raising questions about the proliferation of problematic science as institutions fast-track research during the coronavirus pandemic.”
  See also on The China Project: Chinese mathematics rocked by fake academic paper scam

POLITICS AND CURRENT AFFAIRS:

• Uyghurs push for a genocide designation
  Uighurs push for International Criminal Court case accusing China of genocide / NYT (porous paywall)
  “A team of London-based lawyers representing two Uighur activist groups has filed a complaint against Beijing for pursuing the repatriation of thousands of Uighurs through unlawful arrests in or deportation from Cambodia and Tajikistan. The case could bring greater international scrutiny of the Chinese state’s power to impose its will beyond its borders.”
  Why do Muslim states stay silent over China’s abuse of the Uighurs? / Guardian
• U.S. flexes its muscles in the South China Sea
  With Beijing’s military nearby, U.S. sends 2 aircraft carriers to South China Sea / NYT (porous paywall)
  “The carriers — the Ronald Reagan and the Nimitz — deployed ‘in support of a free and open Indo-Pacific,’ according to a statement by the Navy’s Seventh Fleet.”
  U.S. Navy carriers conduct South China Sea drills as Chinese ships watch / Reuters
  “Two U.S. Navy aircraft carriers are conducting exercises in the contested South China Sea within sight of Chinese naval vessels spotted near the flotilla, the commander of one of the carriers, the USS Nimitz, told Reuters on Monday.”
  U.S., Vietnam and Philippines accuse Beijing of ‘unlawful maritime claims’ with five-day drill in South China Sea / SCMP
  “The United States, Vietnam and the Philippines have lashed out at China, accusing it of coercion as Beijing launches a military drill in a disputed part of the South China Sea.”
  Beijing ‘is ready to counter US’ as both navies hold drills in South China Sea / SCMP
  Is Manila pivoting back to the US with Locsin’s South China Sea warning? / SCMP
  Navy Chief of Information on Twitter: “And yet, there they are. Two @USNavy aircraft carriers operating in the international waters of the South China Sea. #USSNimitz & #USSRonaldReagan are not intimidated #AtOurDiscretion”
• Taiwan expels mainland reporters, opens Guam office
  Taiwan expels 2 mainland Chinese TV reporters over political talk shows / SCMP
  Taiwan will reopen Guam office, a sign of stronger ties with the US in the face of tension with China / SCMP
• Birth tourism ringleader sentenced
  Chinese man who ran birth tourism operation in Irvine sentenced / Orange County Register
  “A Chinese national who ran an Irvine-based travel company targeted by federal officials as a birth tourism operation was sentenced Tuesday to 37 months in prison.”

SOCIETY AND CULTURE:

• Reforming the cutthroat education environment
  Shenzhen schools scrap final exams, class rankings / Sixth Tone
  The move to prohibit releasing exam scores and student rankings is likely aimed at easing some of the pressure felt by students.
• Rural “losers” in elite colleges
  Even at China’s elite colleges, rural kids feel like ‘losers’ / Sixth Tone
  “The phrase ‘exam experts from small towns’ was coined by a Douban user in a blog post describing his ‘mental journey’ from being a top student in high school to a ‘loser’ in university.”
• Beijingers leave the city as soon as restrictions lift
  The mass exodus from Beijing is on / Bloomberg (porous paywall)
  “People in Beijing rushed to buy train and plane tickets out of the Chinese capital after the local government began easing travel restrictions for the first time since an outbreak that was discovered in mid-June.”
• Silencing mainland international students
  The silencing of mainland Chinese international students / Lausan
  A mainland Chinese native in Toronto comments on the backlash towards his China-critical article.