Managing The Dragon

The hallways of the elementary school were filled with students, some as young as four years old, changing classes. Although they were busy going about the business of getting to their next class, each of the students greeted me with an enthusiastic “ni hao” as they passed by. If I had been in a school [...]

As they always do, the fireworks last evening in Beijing ushered in the year of the dragon in spectacular fashion. Most businesses in China will be closed for this week as hundreds of millions of Chinese head home or to vacation spots to be with their family and loved ones over the Spring festival holiday. [...]

When I predicted at the end of 2010 that 2011 would be a banner year for cross-border mergers and acquisitions between China and the United States and China and Europe, I was not alone. Many investment bankers, lawyers and accountants have been gearing up for what everyone believes will ultimately be a big surge in [...]

The Year of the Dragon is upon us, and it’s time to predict how the New Year will turn out. Here’s the way I see it. Prediction #1: China’s economy will grow at 8.5 percent. Having lived and worked in China for 20 years, and having some sense for how the country works, I view [...]

It’s that time again — time to see how clear, or cloudy, my crystal ball was a year ago as 2010 was coming to a close. Going back in time, China watchers were concerned about the health of the country’s economy at the end of last year, just like they are today. The most commonly [...]

With 2011 rapidly coming to a close, economists are busy making their predictions for 2012. Here is what a panel of experts had to say recently to China Daily. Hard Landing: Ardo Hansson, lead economist for China at the World Bank, believes that China may face the risk of a hard landing if the European [...]

In response to our recent post on the Chinese economy,  a reader asked the following: Jack, good summary. Do you have an opinion on the housing bubble? Gordon Chang last month said “Residential property prices are in freefall in China . . . .” Good question. There certainly has been a great deal of commentary [...]

All this year, the drumbeat with respect to China’s economy has been consistent. As the economies in Europe and the United States, China’s two largest export markets, have continued to struggle, and China has tightened credit in its war against inflation, the China economy has been slowing noticeably. In this year’s third quarter, China’s gross domestic [...]

Sometimes, a headline just jumps off the page and grabs your attention. That’s what “Georgia’s Hottest Export: Chopsticks!” did to me.  Sitting in China, which has to be the single largest market for chopsticks in the world, I just couldn’t resist reading the story and learning more. It began by borrowing a line from the [...]

Last week, it was announced that New China Life Insurance Co., a state-backed insurer that is partially owned by Zurich Financial Service AG and is the third-largest life insurance company in China, may raise up to $2.3 billion in an initial public offering in Hong Kong and Shanghai. China Life, Ping An and China Pacific, [...]