As the United States awakens to its supply-chain vulnerabilities amid heightened pressure on companies to “reshore” from China, it is grappling with an uncomfortable truth: most will not end up relocating to the US. And, business experts say, the relatively few that do probably should not have left in the first place. Read Here – […]
The global clout of OPEC, never one of the world’s most admired institutions, reached a nadir in April when a dispute between Saudi Arabia and Russia triggered a price war just as global oil demand was collapsing due to the coronavirus pandemic. Three months later, the cartel has re-emerged as a model of transnational cooperation and […]
The Chinese government is likely to face a tricky economic policy choice in the second half of this year. If it loosens its fiscal stance, public finances will worsen significantly. But if it cuts expenditure to offset the pandemic-related revenue shortfall, growth will be lower, with dire consequences. Read Here – Project Syndicate
The pandemic and the protests of recent months should serve as a reminder of a simple truth: a mask is always just a mask. What matters for democracy is not whether people cover their faces in public, but which people, and why. Read Here – Project Syndicate
Trump badly wants a deal with Chinese President Xi Jinping, while Pompeo wants the United States to stop dealing with China altogether. Unlike Pompeo, Trump has publicly praised Xi and, according to former National Security Advisor John Bolton, even expressed his approval of China’s crackdowns in Xinjiang and Hong Kong. Read Here – Foreign Policy
Even as India and China hold talks to defuse a deadly Himalayan border clash between their troops last month, New Delhi’s next challenge from Beijing is already emerging, over 1,000km (620 miles) away from Indian territory – in Iran. Read Here – South China Morning Post
The “dollar-is-crashing” trade is the ultimate widow-maker. For decades, it’s confounded more punters than bets against Chinese stocks, Japanese debt and Hong Kong property combined. Yet might it soon pay off, finally, thanks to Donald Trump’s blunderbuss of a White House? The odds don’t favour it, at least for now. Read Here – Asia Times
Every month of this year has brought new evidence that voting in 2020 hasn’t been going very well. And with perhaps the most consequential election in generations—when the nation ratifies or rejects President Donald Trump’s divisive agenda—experts are starting to believe that the general election will be much, much worse. Read Here – Politico
China is stepping up pressure on Bhutan to settle their bilateral border dispute. In addition to laying claim to more territory in Bhutan, Beijing has revived an old land swap deal that will require Thimphu to cede control over territory in order to settle its border dispute with China. Read Here – The Diplomat
Who needs Donald Trump’s America? You won’t find these words in Ant Group’s initial public offering prospectus, but they’re written between the lines in bold font as the fintech juggernaut Jack Ma built bypasses New York to list in Hong Kong and Shanghai. Read Here – Asia Times
looking beyond borders 