China

A quarter of the 60 trillion US-Dollar bonds issued by governments and companies worldwide are currently trading at negative yields - which means that 14 trillion dollar of outstanding debt is being paid for by creditors in a bizarre reversal of normal practice. We have now reached a point, where negative yields have forced long-term...

President Donald Trump’s tweeted demands for a weaker dollar, and his subsequent designation of China as a “currency manipulator”, have sparked fears that his trade battles are morphing into a currency war. The last time we had a global competitive devaluation was in the 1930s, as the world descended into the Depression. But today,...

To most people, August 3, 2007, was an ordinary enough summer day. The American stock market fell about 3%, enough to lead the major newspapers, but hardly anything that would generate panic in the streets. Yet to many people who work in economic policy or financial markets, that day was the beginning of what eventually...

When the United States declared China a currency manipulator recently, long-building trade tensions between the world’s two largest economies spread to the combustible realm of currencies, with potentially huge consequences for the global financial system should the escalation continue. By beginning of August, the escalation has reached a stage where central banks in India,...

If you want to understand the developing trade conflict with China, the first thing you need to realize is that nothing Donald Trump is currently doing makes sense. His views on trade are incoherent, His demands are incomprehensible. And he vastly in our opinion overrates his ability to inflict damage on China while underrating...

In 1946, diplomat and historian George F. Kennan writing as Mr. X, sent an 8000 - word telegram to the State Department about Joseph Stalin's aggressive foreign policy. He warned “there would be no permanent peaceful coexistence” between the United States and Soviet Union, and his analysis provided an influential underpinning for America's Cold...

When Xi Jinping strode out in the Great Wall of the People five years ago as China’s new leader, his tight smile barely hid the atmosphere of smoldering crisis. The Communist Party elite had been battered by infighting and scandals involving power grabs, bribery and even murder. Military commanders and state security chieftains-the guardians of one-party-rule had grown grossly corrupt. ...

China has spent nearly five years steering hundreds of billions of dollars toward a bold plan to gain greater global influence by funding big projects across Asia, Eastern Europe and Africa. Now Beijing is starting to tap the brakes. The value of the deals that Chinese companies are striking under the plan – called the Belt and Road Initiative (B.R.I.) –...

President Xi Jinping is poised to make a historic power grab as China’s legislator gather to approve changes that will let him rule indefinitely and undo decades of efforts to prevent a return to crushing dictatorship. This year’s gathering of the ceremonial National People’s Congress has been overshadowed by Xi’s surprise move to end constitutional two-term limits on the presidency. The...

The monks, dressed in crimson robes and wielding blue plastic swords, were rehearsing a dance they would perform the next day in celebrating of the Tibetan New Year. Then a uniformed police officer appeared in the temple and said there were a few questions to answer. So began nearly 17 hours in police custody for a French journalist and photographer, Gilles...