Links » Crème » Friday Links: New subway openings, flattening mountains (hills) again, and pandas playing in the snow
Links » Crème » Friday Links: New subway openings, flattening mountains (hills) again, and pandas playing in the snow |
- Friday Links: New subway openings, flattening mountains (hills) again, and pandas playing in the snow
- New Internet regulations may require real-name registration to service providers
- U.S.-China Audit Dispute: Wrong Time to Pick a Fight?
- Guangzhou Reforms Public Kindergarten Admission
| Posted: 28 Dec 2012 05:00 AM PST
With interactive graphics. "Bloomberg News series 'Revolution to Riches' lifts the veil of secrecy on China's princelings, an elite class that has been able to amass wealth and influence because of their bloodline." (Bloomberg) Mountains/hills being moved again. "Yanan, the iconic centre of the Communist Party's revolutionary past, has answered the central government's call for urbanisation by flattening an area of the erosion-prone Loess Plateau almost as large as Hong Kong Island." (SCMP) Look at what Chinese media is reporting: "A man from central China's Anhui Province reported to the police that he was illegally detained for two months after petitioning in Beijing, Beijing News reported Thursday. // Wang Weilong came to Beijing and revealed his grievances to staff with the Supreme People's Court on September 21. However, the next day, he was brought away by several unidentified men at Beijing South Railway Station when he planned to go home. // Wang was detained by unknown men from September 22 to November 18. During the detention, Wang was ironed." (Sina) And: "Local officials in Nanpi county, Hebei Province, Thursday fired a land and resources official after being accused of detaining and attempting to bribe a journalist who was reporting on damage caused to farmland by illegal soil exploitation, the Beijing-based magazine China Newsweek reported Thursday. // The magazine said He Zhiqi, deputy secretary of the CPC Nanpi County Committee visited its office Thursday and told editors that local official Xue Wenyuan's actions were unacceptable." (Global Times) Apple loses again. "A Chinese court has fined Apple Inc 1 million yuan ($160,400) for hosting third-party applications on its App Store that were selling pirated electronic books, the official Xinhua news agency reported on Friday." (Reuters) New subways! "Four new subway lines, including the first phase of Line 6, second phase of Line 10, north section of Line 9 and south section of Line 8, will open to the public on Sunday afternoon, the Legal Mirror reported Thursday." (Global Times) "Scambusters." "Kenny is the founder of International Recovery Service (IRS), an organisation that uses underhand tactics to persuade scammers to repay their victims. Usually this persuasion comes in the form of catching the villain red‑handed and threatening to go public with the evidence of their crime if the client is not repaid." (TimeOut Beijing) Belated, but good. Spoiler: Song Jiaoren is assassinated. "At 10.40pm on March 20th 1913 a young man who represented one possible future for China stood on the platform at Shanghai railway station, waiting with friends to board a train to Beijing. Song Jiaoren—30 years old, sporting a Western suit and a wisp of a moustache—had just brilliantly led his new political party, the Nationalists, to overwhelming success in parliamentary elections, the country's first attempt at democracy after two millennia of imperial rule. He was in line to become China's first democratically elected prime minister, and to help draft a new constitution for the Republic of China." (Economist) Belated, sad. "A minivan carrying 15 children to kindergarten plunged into a roadside pond in a rural area of eastern China on Monday, killing 11 children, state media and an official said." (CBA News) Man trips criminal in Shanghai, via Shanghaiist: Finally… "Freedom of faith" and Auxiliary Bishop Thaddeus Ma Daqin of Shanghai. (UCA News) Pandas playing in the snow. (Sina, below)
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| New Internet regulations may require real-name registration to service providers Posted: 27 Dec 2012 10:22 PM PST Via Xinhua:
It's for your own good, people:
No government can protect you if you're anonymous:
Real-name anonymity is the future of the Internet:
Global Voices has gathered some very smart responses from online users in China. People are wondering out loud whether the new measure is merely to control freedom of speech, while acknowledging it's currently not difficult for officials to track down real identities anyway. Writes @游离的世界已经灰白："The Internet is a sword hanging over the head of officials! Legislation is necessary, but the key is how to deal with both the protection of officials and the protection of citizens' freedom of speech. Which comes the first?" China's top legislature mulls Internet regulatory measures (Xinhua, via Global Voices) |
| U.S.-China Audit Dispute: Wrong Time to Pick a Fight? Posted: 27 Dec 2012 08:32 PM PST I know I said recently that I would limit my comments on the ongoing fight between the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and its Chinese counterparts over access to audit materials, but an Op/Ed in yesterday's Financial Times forced my hand (or mouth, as it were). I'll just do the lazy man's cut-paste-comment method instead of trying to summarize the thesis of Ann Lee, the author. Suffice it to say that Lee believes now is not the time for the U.S. to be picking this fight and that the downside of doing so might be significant. I find her arguments to be less than persuasive.
Let's have a look.
Fair enough. One could bring this up with just about any bilateral issue. The U.S.-China relationship is important and America should think twice before ratcheting up tensions. That being said, this cannot be a blanket reason for inaction on all fronts. Moreover, there is a need for additional oversight of U.S.-listed Chinese companies, many of which have been caught cooking the books. Surely the SEC, whose primary job is, or at least used to be, to protect investors (particularly non-institutional investors), can justify the need to act here. If this dispute ends up with numerous Chinese companies de-listing, would Beijing retaliate against American foreign investors? I doubt it. China is big on reciprocity, but on a proportional basis. There is no reason to believe that China would somehow institute broad ranging market access restrictions against U.S. foreign direct investment. Perhaps something narrowly targeted (whatever that might be), but "corporate America" need not worry about this dispute too much.
Lee, who used to work for a hedge fund, seems very concerned with investment opportunities. That's fine, but she doesn't seem too worried about consumer protection. That's why we have securities law in the first place, and even hedge funds benefit from greater transparency. Yes, it's possible that this fight might result in some Chinese companies de-listing, but does Lee really prefer that the SEC look the other way and simply trust that these companies and their auditors will cease tolerating fraud? As to a U.S. reputation of hostility towards Chinese companies, I think that horse left the barn years ago (Huawei? ZTE? CNOOC?) and this dispute will neither be the genesis of such a reputation nor the end of its existence. Besides, in contrast to the treatment of companies like Huawei and ZTE, many of these U.S.-listed Chinese companies have already been found guilty of wrongdoing. Surely some of this "hostility" is warranted?
OK, my first reaction to this is to admit that yes, it is possible that the rules at issue here are flawed. Unfortunately, Ms. Lee never provides any details on what those flaws are or how the law might be rewritten to ameliorate the situation. Additionally, Ms. Lee is once again showing off her investor mindset here by complaining about Sarbanes-Oxley. Look, I'm no fan of that law either, and I've had more than one Chinese company here tell me of how it shelved its U.S. IPO plans after factoring in the time and expense of legal compliance. Yes, Sarbanes-Oxley may have resulted in fewer Chinese companies listing in the U.S. Ms. Lee sees this as lost investment opportunities. But it's also possible that some of these companies never belonged on a U.S. exchange to begin with and that Sarbanes-Oxley scared off some bad actors, a victory for consumer protection.
Uh, wow. Some real cognitive dissonance here. This whole dispute is about transparency and consumer protection. This benefits smaller investors more than the big boys, who should have sufficient resources to fully vet some of these dodgy Chinese companies. Ms. Lee is absolutely right that the SEC has been asleep on the job when it comes to prosecuting the folks responsible for the Great Recession, but how is that at all related to this dispute? Moreover, if some Chinese companies are forced to de-list as a result of this fight, how does this enrich the "privileged few" and deprive "society at large"? I'm genuinely puzzled by that statement.
Blah blah blah. Why can't we all just get along and sing kumbaya around the campfire? Please. The U.S. government is not picking fights with everyone, but it is trying to fix an outstanding problem that has already led to significant investor losses, not to mention across-the-board valuation problems for many U.S.-listed Chinese companies that have done nothing wrong (i.e., guilt by association). And what's this about respecting one another's laws? These companies are coming into the U.S. to avail themselves of the American capital market. Shouldn't they have to follow U.S. law? I've represented U.S. companies in China for well over a decade, and believe me, they all have to follow China law when they come here. What's the difference? Moreover, note that when Ms. Lee says that nations should respect one another's laws, in this instance she is really suggesting that the U.S. should defer to China's laws, but she has not explained why. Yes, there is a conflicting China law here, involving the disclosure of information that may be deemed state secrets. I personally think this state secrets argument is a pretext, but either way, if a compromise cannot be reached, we're dealing with U.S. listings, and U.S. legal concerns should prevail. Remember that the U.S. law at issue here is not discriminatory; it applies regardless of nationality. Finally, Ms. Lee talks about a "diplomatic solution" as the first course of action. She must have been busy or something, because the authorities in both countries have been discussing this issue and looking for a solution for a year already. So far, diplomacy hasn't worked, but it definitely has been tried. Try as I might, I'm not persuaded by any argument that places all the blame on the SEC and calls for some sort of unilateral disarmament. That might be acceptable to certain large, savvy investors, but not for everyone else. © Stan for China Hearsay, 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us |
| Guangzhou Reforms Public Kindergarten Admission Posted: 27 Dec 2012 04:28 PM PST
The nexus of public sector, privilege, the income gap and education in China is fascinating, as this story from down south illustrates quite well. Good on the GZ government for trying to make the system more fair, although we'll see if this change actually does anything to ameliorate the situation. Keep in mind that privilege is not just about what position your parents hold in the government, but also how much cash parents can shell out for "extra" fees paid to schools or staff. Dealing with that sort of corruption is just as important, so let's hope that's on the agenda as well. © Stan for China Hearsay, 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us |
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