Welcome to the 82nd 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 discuss some vague progress in the seemingly never-ending U.S.-China trade war. At the Boao Forum for Asia, Premier Li Keqiang 李克强 said the trade frictions between the two countries shouldn’t even be called a war, stating, “The purpose of trade is to avoid war. If you were doing business with a knife, then it wouldn’t be business anymore.”
- We chat about a recent report from a U.K. watchdog, which said that further issues have been identified in Huawei’s engineering processes that pose additional risks to Britain’s telecom networks.
- We analyze a new report from Huawei, which released data for its performance last year. It hit a sales record of $100 billion in 2018, up 20 percent year-on-year, with net profit climbing 25 percent.
- We hear the news that top Chinese liquor brand Kweichow Moutai’s Shanghai-listed stocks closed at a record high of $128 last Friday as the company reported strong profit growth in its 2018 earnings report.
- We report that China will issue 5G wireless communications licenses by year-end as the country pushes aggressively into the cutting-edge technology that could power everything from self-driving cars to telemedicine.
- We learn that JPMorgan Chase and Nomura Holding won approval to set up new securities joint ventures in China with majority foreign ownership as regulators followed through on a promise to open up the country’s financial markets.
- We note that shares of Chinese companies linked to growing cannabis plunged last week after several firms were asked to disclose progress on industrial cannabis projects.
In addition, we talk with Caixin managing editor Doug Young about the IPO of a Chinese online education company and a string of recent news in the auto industry in China.
