The special Sino Saturday edition of our popular newsletter for leaders, by Time Inc. international editor Clay Chandler.
Leadership CEO Daily America’s Trade War with China: Get Ready for « a Little Pain »
HNA’s Hilton stake. China’s heavily indebted HNA Group plans to divest some or all of its $6.3 billion stake in Hilton. HNA, which is Hilton’s largest shareholder with a 26.1% stake, announced the impending sale on Thursday through a regulatory filing with the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Reuters
To hell with Wall Street. Trump’s recent trade tariffs will force China to address the issue of forced technology transfers, and are a strong signal that “the game of continual delay is over”, according to former White House Steve Bannon. “To hell with Wall Street if they don’t like it. It’s time somebody stood up to them and Donald Trump is the perfect guy. Wall Street is always short term,” Bannon added. CNBC
Freer free ports. Global business leaders and government officials will head to Hainan this Sunday for the annual Boao Forum, widely known as the Asian version of Davos. China president Xi Jinping is expected to present “the most authoritative interpretation” on China’s 40 years of economic reforms and opening up as part of h’s keynote speech, as well as announce the establishment of free-trade ports in Chinese provinces potentially including Hainan. South China Morning Post
Bike pairing. Meituan-Dianping, one of China’s highest-funded startups offering services from food delivery to hotel bookings, announced it was buying Tencent-backed Mobike for approximately US$3.4 billion, the largest bike-sharing deal to date. The purchase instantly makes Meituan one of the two largest bike-sharing operators, along with Alibaba-funded Ofo. This is what it might mean for the bike-sharing industry. Financial Times
AI academy. Former Google China head Li Kaifu’s Sinovation Ventures has launched a new 5-year artificial intelligence training program in partnership with China’s Ministry of Education and Peking University. Under the program, Li will work with Cornell professor John David Hopcroft to develop an AI curriculum to train at least 500 teachers and 5,000 students at top Chinese universities over the next five years. Wired
Walmart gets wired. Walmart has opened its first high-tech supermarket in partnership with Chinese online retailer JD.com. The newly launched supermarket in the southern tech hub of Shenzhen stocks products that customers can purchase with their smartphones via JD.com’s JD Daojia platform or Tencent’s WeChat messaging app. Walmart first partnered with JD.com two years ago as both companies struggled to overcome the retail dominance of Alibaba, and Walmart last week announced that it would drop Alibaba’s Alipay services in stores in favour of Tencent’s WeChat payments. Reuters
Alibaba’s growing appetite. Alibaba has purchased the remaining 57% stake of China food delivery app Ele.me it doesn’t already own, bringing the app’s valuation up to $9.5b. Tech companies such as Alibaba and Tencent, which has invested billions of dollars in Meituan-Dianping, are eager to cash in on China’s growing online food delivery market, which is expected to grow 18% to 241 billion yuan ($38 billion) this year. Financial Times
There’s a Real Risk That Trump’s Trade War With China Won’t Change Anything TIME The Case of Hong Kong’s Missing Booksellers New York Times A Hong Kong Newspaper on a Mission to Promote China’s Soft Power New York Times Was Letting China Into the WTO a Mistake? Foreign Affairs Huawei flourishes despite perennial hurdles in US Financial Times Inside Xiaomi: The perks and perils of startups that join its ecosystem Tech in Asia This entire Chinese village is a shrine to Xi Jinping CNN Only men loyal to the party can now donate sperm in China South China Morning Post
By invite. Kim Jong-un’s surprise China visit last week was initiated by North Korea and not Beijing, according to official media in Pyongyang. China issued an invitation to Kim after Pyongyang suggested the visit to Xi and the Chinese Communist Party leadership, the Korean Central News Agency (KNCA) said. South China Morning Post
Trade thief. The U. S. Justice Department this week sentenced Chinese scientist Weiqiang Zhang to 10 years in a federal prison on three counts of conspiracy to steal trade secrets and interstate transportation of stolen property. Zhang was arrest last year for attempting to steal genetically engineered rice seeds from an American research facility. Reuters
Bibles banned. China’s online retailers such as Taobao, JD.com and Amazon China have scrubbed its virtual shelves of the Bible, in an apparent move by Beijing to restrict its distribution. The crackdown comes as Beijing and the Vatican are negotiating a deal on the appointment of bishops in China, which could see both parties restore ties severed in 1951. New York Times
Busted for bribery. China-born media publisher Julia Wang of South-South News has pleaded guilty to a U. S. bribery probe involving a former U. N. General Assembly president. Wang had tried to buy diplomatic posts with Antigua’s government through former deputy U. N. ambassador from the Dominican Republic Francis Lorenzo and John Ashe, a former U. N. ambassador who was also General Assembly president. Reuters
Summaries by Debbie Yong. @debyong debbie.yong@timeinc.com
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