Comments by "Peter Jacobsen" (@pjacobsen1000) on "China Update" channel.

  1. EV sales slump notwithstanding, X-Peng, NIO, and Li Auto all have some great looking cars. Very different from the drab models otherwise seen in the Chinese car market.
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  2. In practice it's not that bad, though it may sound bad.
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  3. What's the corgi vs. chicken fight? Something to do with the queen's dogs?
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  4. I'd like to se someone (perhaps not this channel) take a deep dive into which industries will leave China first and which will stay on. For example, it's one thing to move an assembly line to Vietnam, but if all the components are made in China first and then shipped down in boxes, it's not much of a difference. Despite having lived in China for decades, I am still sometimes astonished when I open my Taobao app and see the multitude of products made here. It's basically everything you can imagine, and even a lot of things you can't imagine. As an example, whatever kitchen knife set you are thinking of buying, it seems most likely it will be made in China. Recently, I've seen assorted western branded kitchen paring knives sold in bulk for $1/piece. These are not fakes, but excess production.
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  5. People like Tony and I and other viewers of this channel, and tens of thousands of others live here. We have a pretty good idea of what is going on.
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  6. There's also the Jamestown Foundation, but only in writing, no videos. They have some very good and deep, some might say downright nerdy, analyses of China's geo-strategic actions.
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  7. Excellent update, as usual. An observation from the ground here in Shanghai: We're seeing an increase in government investment in 'Common Prosperity' infrastructure projects here, among them early beginnings of installation of elevators in the thousands of 'public housing' neighborhoods, 6-story walk-ups built in the 80s and 90s that make up around a third of all housing in Shanghai. This will be popular with the aging middle class that occupy these apartments (or flats, as you'd say), it will provide jobs for construction companies and local elevator manufacturers, but perhaps it also illustrates how difficult it is becoming to find projects with good, or any, return on investment. There's also a fair bit of commercial office space being developed in my area, but it seems to fill up very slowly.
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  8. Typhoon season usually starts in summer. Many typhoons over the season with several hitting China every year (it's a big place, after all, so hard to miss). In my many years in Shanghai, I only remember a couple of direct hits to the city. The worst was in 2014, I think. The streets were littered with tree branches, twigs, leaves and other debris. A handful of people got killed, mostly fishermen who had not made it to port in time. Some billboards, shop signs and awnings were blown to pieces.
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  9. There may very well be lots of Chinese people who will buy these bonds. They have little else to invest their money in. It used to be real estate, but now they will put their money in anything that can give just 2-3% per year.
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  10. People living in China know how WeChat can increase productivity, but 'trial by WeChat', that's a new one for me.
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  11. 0:12 I thought that was President Xi arriving in Saudi Arabia by camel.
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  12. Considering their rigor in testing (here in Shanghai we've gotten tested every 48 hours), I find it mindboggling that they don't simultaneously offer vaccinations at the testing site. They have the medical staff on hand and they could strongly 'encourage' any laggards to get vaccinated. My community has an overweight of elderly. I don't know how many are vaccinated, but a constant nagging would persuade a large number to get the jab. There hasn't even been any mention of getting vaccinated during this lock down. Nothing in government advisories, or community chat groups, or from the Neighborhood Committee.
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  13. Brunei and Malaysia both pump a lot of oil from the SCS, thought I don't know if it's considered 'deep sea'.
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  14.  @ChinaUpdate  Thanks, Tony. BTW, your city of Ningbo, would you categorize that as 2nd or 3rd tier? Sometimes I feel like Hangzhou should be considered a 1st tier city, but there doesn't seem to be clear divisions.
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  15.  @gtw4546  Thanks, let's see how it goes.
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  16. Regarding the PMI: Does anyone know how these numbers are tabulated? For example, if you simply survey Purchasing Managers, you could have the following example: 10 manufacturers each have 10% of the market. You survey them once, and the growth number is flat. Then one manufacturer goes bankrupt and the rest take over that share. Even with a flat market, at the next survey, those 9 will now report a 9% increase in production. Such a scenario will give a false result, so that's why I'm wondering how it's tabulated.
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  17. It seems very different in Asia. Whether it is Japan, HK or Singapore, high rise apartment buildings generally seem very well kept and orderly.
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  18.  @bluerisk  Well, there's no doubt that housing built in the 1990s and 2000s in China seem to quickly deteriorate, but that may be due to poor construction quality. Apart from that, there really is a difference with Western countries. You hardly ever see vandalism, graffiti, youth gangs or social decay in Chinese residential complexes. That could change in the future, of course, but I doubt it. There is a cultural difference. I'd like to see us westerners learn from East Asian countries in that respect, though I don't know how we'd do it. Culture is hard to change.
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  19. They're not 'utterly dependent'. They're Iran's biggest buyer, so that gives them leverage. But they can also get oil from so many other places, and indeed, they already spread their oil purchases around the world, exactly because they don't want to be too dependent on one country.
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  20. Re. demographic data around marriages: We should remember that there are a lot fewer women of prime marriage age now than there were in 2013. 27-year-old women in 2013: 12.5 million 27-year-old women in 2021: 8.0 million
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  21. Re. infrastructure spending, the field of energy generation will still be a good place for the govt. to invest. Nuclear, wind, solar, Ultra High Voltage powerlines. These both help reduce China's need for imported fossil fuels and help to achieve China's goal of reducing CO2 emissions. I don't think China needs more airports, expressways, high speed rail, or at least they won't help the economy grow much, if at all.
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  22. No, fundamental restructuring in this context means allocating more money to consumers and less to manufacturers. This could be in implementing a better social security system, or better healthcare system, or better pension system. The idea is that if people have access to those things, they will feel more comfortable spending their money, rather than saving them for retirement, or saving them for a potential extended hospital stay. In other words, lots of money would then be freed up for domestic consumption.
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  23.  @doujinflip  Yes, that's a major issue for short term visitors.
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  24. I'm sure there is at least one company in China declaring bankruptcy daily, as there is in the US and every other very large economy.
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  25. I remember when it was 8.3 to the Dollar. It stayed that way from the mid-90s until around 2007.
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  26. "In order to have a strong economy, first, you must convince the people and the world, that one has a strong economy." While this may sound a little wacky, it harks back to Chairman Mao, who said something to the effect of "The masses can accomplish anything, as long as they have the correct political ideas, and the correct guidance". We can take this even further back to Karl Marx, who, many years after publishing his theories was both surprised and disappointed that the workers had not yet started a revolution and overthrown the capitalists. He concluded that the working class simply did not have the intellectual capacity to understand his wonderful ideas, not even stopping to consider that perhaps the working class HAD thought about his ideas but decided instead to keep their jobs and fight for better working conditions by setting up labor unions. One could almost reach the conclusion that Marx, Lenin and Mao were the ones who had the least confidence in the working class they claim to represent.
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  27.  @skydragon23101979  I do not doubt the will of the Chinese people to succeed in every endeavor. Unfortunately, the phrase you mention is not always true. There is not always a way, no matter how great the will is.
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  28. Certainly, China could sell its $700 billion in US treasury bonds, and that would probably cause some volatility in the market for a period of time, but let's not forget that the US bond market has a value of over $50,000 billion and the stock market has a value of $12,000 billion, so $700 billion can easily be absorbed by the market.
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  29. A few counterpoints: "manufacturing is collapsing". Manufacturing in China is far from collapsing. Follow the charts often presented here on this channel regarding PMI. It's stable, and often increasing. However, in the long term it will probably decrease. "China will NOT be able to afford its military expansion". Even poor countries can expand their military: North Korea, Iran, Russia are good examples. It's all about how much of GDP you allocate to defense spending. China will be able to afford military expansion for decades to come.
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  30.  @seabedsand  "blame China". We don't blame China, we just intend to protect our economies from Chinese imports.
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  31. All this match fixing that has been going on in Chinese sports for years makes me wonder if China would propose a match-fixing deal on a China-Taiwan war: How much would Taiwan need to be paid to lose the fight in round one?
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  32.  @sayamalu2495  I better stock up on food today.
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  33. But a genuine depression is not very likely. Even a recession is unlikely, at least in the near future. More likely is a slow creep towards zero growth, taking perhaps 15-20 years.
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  34. Nice with a view of some Kiwi sheep, for a change.
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  35. Yes, pretty steamy in Shanghai today. 40 degrees. At 7:30 PM it was still 38.
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  36. It's impressive how adept it is at peeling the bark off before chewing into the core.
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  37. Huh, that's interesting. I have yet to catch anything. Are you and your friends up north? That appears to be where the bulk of sickness is. Perhaps later in the winter it will move down south.
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  38. I'm going to guess that data out tomorrow will show retail up slightly. It's just guess, but I feel that people here in Shanghai are slightly more optimistic, slightly more willing to spend. Tomorrow we'll know if I was right.
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  39. I think Christmas 2022 was already a bit muted, wasn't it? People in the west focus on the basics now.
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  40. You're channeling my thoughts exactly. Countries in the Global South most likely don't care where the money comes from, as long as it comes to them. Once China's largesse dies down, India's might be on the rise, and then all those countries will court India. And we can't blame them. Countries, especially in Africa, really need a lot of foreign investment to help propel them into the middle class.
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  41.  @jacksmith-mu3ee  "Heard china collapse for 60 years". Nobody started talking about that until 25 years ago, and back then it was just a crank. More serious concerns about China's economy started surfacing 15 years ago, but it is still only cranks who talk about 'collapse'.
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  42. It could be true, there is just not any evidence that it is true. It could also be true that ribeye steaks are at a 90% discount at Target. Are you going to jump in your car right now because of that?
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  43.  @beckyconstantinides2546  Yes, it is often hard to get the real numbers. All potential investors should be aware of that.
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  44. Tesla is doing quite well in the Chinese market. They're all over the place here in Shanghai. They are also good with PR. They say little, but stand by what little they say. And Tesla Shanghai export a lot of their vehicles, which was part of the deal they signed up for.
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  45. Re. Movie imports: When I first came to China in 1996, the quota for foreign films was 6 per year, and not all of them were equally interesting. Fortunately, already back then, the black market for films on disk was thriving, with basically every Hollywood movie available for a small sum.
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  46. Not to be confused with 'a lethal blow': https://youtu.be/07w9kvwE5oc
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  47.  @skydragon23101979  Sure, but it will take a long, long time before China can replace Airbus and Boeing. So far, only one C919 aircraft has been delivered to a customer. In comparison, Airbus and Boeing combined have delivered over 4000 aircraft to China. And finally, let's not forget that the C919 is made of mostly imported equipment.
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  48.  @discursion  I mean 'for the well-off'.
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  49. What? Diplomacy is 外交。Passive aggressive is 被动攻击. I don't see any connection.
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  50.  @Andy-P  It's possible. NIO, while being a beautiful car, is still deep in start-up debt and sales figures are still relatively low. But they have a lot of value in design and brand.
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