BEIJING | Thu Mar 22, 2012 7:48am IST BEIJING (Reuters) – Consumption will overtake investment as China’s biggest driver of economic growth in 2012 for the first time in more than a decade, the Ministry of Commerce’s research institute said in a report. Consumption was last the No. 1 growth engine in 2001, when...
Windows Phone 7 can’t get no respect–well, from consumers, anyway. Microsoft’s mobile operating system, despite receiving favorable write-ups from tech reviewers, has a miniscule percentage of the global phone market. Still, Microsoft is confident of Windows Phone’s chances in what will soon be the world’s largest smartphone market: China. Microsoft’s short-term goal is ambitious:...
By JOSH CHIN and BRIAN SPEGELE BEIJING—China’s social-media services, which had allowed wide discussion of controversial politician Bo Xilai since his ouster last week, are now cracking down on searches for his name, as his downfall seems to have put much of the country on edge and given rise to fevered rumors of political...
By Jim Woods China “hard landing” alarms are starting to get loud. During a conference in Singapore last week, Adrian Mowat, JPMorgan Chase’s (JPM) chief Asian and emerging-market strategist, came right out and made the hard landing call. In fact, Mowat said the issue now is even beyond debate. “If you look...
Pedestrians walk past an Agricultural Bank of China Ltd. branch in Beijing. Photographer: Nelson Ching/Bloomberg China boosted rural credit by cutting reserve requirements for an additional 379 branches of Agricultural Bank of China Ltd., the nation’s third-biggest lender by market value. Effective March 25, the ratio falls by 2 percentage points for the branches...
This fall China will have a new leader, widely expected to be Xi Jinping, the country’s vice president, who recently met President Obama in Washington. Doubtless every move of a Xi regime would be closely watched: Will China carry on buying the United States’ government debt? Will it commit to action on climate change?...
(Financial Times) — The return of Chinese property developers to the international bond markets in recent weeks highlights a surge in investor appetite for the sector even as the mainland housing market continues to deteriorate. Having been effectively locked out of the bond markets during the second half of 2011, Agile Property, KWG Property...
WASHINGTON/NEW YORK — The United States dealt a blow to U.S. solar panel manufacturers and boosted shares in Chinese rivals when it imposed unexpectedly low duties on imports from China, though the move still drew fire from China industry representatives. The action, made public late on Tuesday, adds to trade tension between the world’s two...
WASHINGTON — The Commerce Department is imposing new import fees on solar panels made in China, finding that the Chinese government is improperly giving subsidies to manufacturers of the panels there. The Commerce Department said Tuesday it has found on a preliminary basis that Chinese solar panel makers have received government subsidies of 2.9 percent...
By Chikako Mogi TOKYO (Reuters) – Asian shares eased on Wednesday, as concerns about China’s slowing economy dampened the optimism generated by a brightening outlook for the U.S. economy that has been pushing equity markets higher since late last year. But financial spreadbetters predicted major European markets would open up to 0.7 percent higher,...
