The Caixin-Sinica Business Brief, episode 7

05/27/17 • 41 min

Welcome to the seventh 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 includes a business news roundup, conversations with Caixin reporters and editors, and a selection of complete stories from the news, read by Kaiser and Sinica rotating co-host Ada Shen. This week, we look at the crackdown on "fake equity, real debt" by China's financial regulators, at the downgrade by Moody's of China's sovereign credit rating, and at the upcoming IPO of Shenzhen biotech giant BGI. We chat with Poornima Weerasekara about the reasons for the box office success of a Bollywood film about a family of wrestlers, and with Doug Young about Chinese companies' acquisitions of a Australian condom maker and the popular gay dating app Grindr. We also bring you five complete stories: The latest chapter in the Rise of the Machines sees a Chinese weiqi (Go) champ defeated by a Google AI system. The connections between dirt-dishing billionaire-on-the-lam Guo Wengui and former British prime minister Tony Blair, who helped connect Guo with funds from the emirate of Abu Dhabi. Beijing's "stores without doors" struggle to cope after the city government walls over many illegal storefronts around the capital. The Chinese government reacts to a scientific fraud scandal after a German academic journal retracts over 100 cancer-related papers for plagiarism and fake peer reviews. Poor pay, along with physical and verbal abuse, provokes a critical shortage of nurses in China’s hospitals. We’d love to hear your feedback on this new product. Please send any comments and suggestions to [email protected]. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Previous Episode

The Caixin-Sinica Business Brief, episode 6

Welcome to the sixth 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 includes a business news roundup, conversations with Caixin reporters and editors, and a selection of complete stories from the news, read by Kaiser and Sinica rotating co-host Ada Shen. This week, we look at some of the big numbers from the Belt and Road Forum, which concluded after two days of clear skies in Beijing. We hear about "combustible ice," a source of methane gas that can be found in permafrost and under seabeds. We look at Alibaba's earning results, which owe at least some of their shine to the tremendous penetration that mobile payment platform Alipay is making. We then speak with Caixin Global editor Doug Young about the state of mobile payments in China, and with Caixin macroeconomics reporter Fran Wang about some of the macro numbers for April. We also bring you five complete stories: China Unicom admits to huge falsification of revenues in Shaanxi Province. Chinese smartphone brands are faring very well in the fast-growing Indian smartphone market. Ant Financial plans to seek a massive loan for a planned acquisition of MoneyGram. A massive algae bloom in Yunnan’s Erhai Lake is hurting tourism and agriculture in the region. Poor practices of supposed conservation workers threaten a 600-year-old early Ming heritage site in Anhui Province. We’d love to hear your feedback on this new product. Please send any comments and suggestions to [email protected]. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Next Episode

The Caixin-Sinica Business Brief, episode 8

Welcome to the eighth 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 includes a business news roundup, conversations with Caixin reporters and editors, and a selection of complete stories from the news, read by Kaiser and Sinica rotating co-host Ada Shen. This week, we look at the corruption case of Wang Bao'an 王保安, the former head of the statistics bureau who received a life sentence for 153 million yuan ($22.5 million) in ill-gotten gains. We chat with Doug Young about the quick delisting and relisting to the New York Stock Exchange of Mindray, China's largest medical equipment manufacturer, and with Poornima Weerasekara about the full-size Titanic replica in landlocked Sichuan Province. We also bring you four complete stories: How gambling debts have led to the suspension of the top coach of the Chinese women’s table tennis team, Kong Linghui 孔令辉. How Chinese-built railroads are putting growth in East Africa on the fast track. How a growing number of Chinese couples, desperate for children, are turning to surrogacy despite its being illegal. An in-depth look at Wang Bao'an, including details of how Chinese media interpreted his case as a signal that more than 100 million yuan in bribes may set a new standard for the "extremely corrupt." We’d love to hear your feedback on this new product. Please send any comments and suggestions to [email protected]. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.