Welcome to the 54th installment of the Caixin-Sinica Business Brief, a weekly podcast that brings you the most important business stories of the week from China’s top source for business and financial news. Produced by Kaiser Kuo of our Sinica Podcast, it features a business news roundup, plus conversations with Caixin reporters and editors.
This week:
- We explore how China’s solar industry will suffer after the government decided to cut a series of subsidies that have fueled the industry’s boom for nearly a decade.
- We note that China plans to impose restrictions on the pay of film and television stars as it grapples with a tax-evasion scandal that has rocked the entertainment industry and ensnared top actress Fan Bingbing 范冰冰.
- We learn that Huawei is not apologizing for flying Australian lawmakers to visit its Chinese headquarters, after a think tank listed it as the biggest corporate sponsor of overseas travel for the country’s national politicians over the last eight years.
- We hear that shares of Chinese dating app Momo fell by sharply last week after a short seller accused the company of concealing important information from investors.
- We discuss Shenzhen’s OptimumNano Energy, the world’s fourth-largest manufacturer of batteries for new-energy vehicles, which told its workers to go on leave for six months as intense competition and high material costs have driven its finances into the red.
- We discover that China’s biggest electric-vehicle carmaker BYD is going to plow $4 billion into quadrupling its car battery output through 2020, despite overcapacity in the industry.
- We analyze how China’s removal of restrictions on foreign investments in gasoline stations will clear the way for global oil giants like BP to operate more wholly owned stations in the country.
- We find out that Beijing’s traffic police are in trouble for allowing the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China to monopolize traffic-fine payments in the capital.
In addition, we talk with Tanner Brown, an editor and product director for Caixin Global, about a 19-year-old woman who recently killed herself after being allegedly sexually assaulted by her teacher, and what this case says about suicide in China.
We’d love to hear your feedback on this product. Please send any comments and suggestions to sinica@thechinaproject.com.
