Yuan sinks: News briefing — September 28, 2022

Here’s what else you need to know about China today:

China’s yuan sank to its lowest point against the U.S. dollar since 2008, with the onshore exchange rate for the currency falling 0.7% to 7.2268 today per the Financial Times.

• “Do not bet on one-way appreciation or depreciation of the yuan, as losses will definitely be incurred in the long term,” the People’s Bank of China said in a strongly worded statement (in Chinese) released on Wednesday, per Bloomberg’s translation.

Another attack on Chinese nationals in Pakistan: An armed attacker who posed as a dental patient has killed a man and injured two other people — all three of whom were Chinese-Pakistani dual nationals who worked at the Karachi clinic for 40 years. The attacker, a man in his thirties, escaped on a motorbike with an accomplice and “didn’t hurt Pakistanis” in the incident, authorities said.

The China Project reported in May: Failed suicide bombing in Pakistan sends more chills down Beijing’s spine.

Hong Kong’s national security watchdogs are on high alert ahead of China’s National Day, after police arrested two men for posting “seditious messages” online that “promote feelings of ill will and enmity between different classes of the population of Hong Kong and incite the use of violence.”

• Meanwhile, some members of one of the city’s few remaining pro-democracy parties, the League of Social Democrats (LSD), have claimed that they received phone calls from authorities asking about their plans and warning them not to do anything on the “sensitive date.”

Large Chinese flying boat ready for the market: Yesterday, the AG600 Kunlong flying boat, developed in China by Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) 中国航空工业集团, successfully completed a 12-ton water drop test, after which a purchase agreement for six aircraft was signed at the test site. See today’s Business briefs from the Chinese media, with more links and info on:

• The decrease in industrial profits by 2.1% so far this year.
• China’s most (and least) livable cities.

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