The much awarded journalist Ian Johnson is joining today the China Speakers Bureau. Working in China since 1984, Ian worked for the Wall Street Journal as feature writer and bureau chief for twelve years.He is currently living in Beijing and Berlin as an independent journalist, working both for the New York Review of Books and the Wall Street Journal.Read More →

The newly established Bureau of Real Estate Registration might signal a new track for the central government to control its unruly real estate sector, writes financial analyst Sara Hsu in the Diplomat. “The real estate registration system will increase transparency in property rights, which is certainly an improvement over the murkiness of today’s diverse and localized registration platforms.”Read More →

When the Hu-Wen government abolished the agricultural tax, everybody sang high praise. But it robbed local governments from their only source of income, apart from land sales and its corrupt practices. The National Audit Office is now trying to correct some of those wrongdoings, writes financial analyst Sara Hsu in Triple Crisis.Read More →

Anti-trust actions, anti-corruption drives and safety issues have made corporate life for foreign firms in China tougher than 10, 15 years ago. Whether they will actually leave China in larger numbers depends on how the costs of doing business develop, writes financial analyst Sara Hsu in the Diplomat.Read More →

Six years after introducing anti-trust legislation, China´s authorities have started to use those tools. Foreign firms fear they are targets, but business analyst Ben Cavender sees at CNBC another reason: the growing anxiety at the central government for the huge inequality in China´s incomes.Read More →

China´s central government tries to shift its economy from investment-driven to a consumer-drive one. While the effort seems to have effect, financial analyst Sara Hsu points at a few bears at this road in the Diplomat. Will the consumers keep on spending more? It´s in the hand of the government itself.Read More →

China´s is setting up five asset management companies or bad banks to buy up bad debts on a local level, comparable to five national firms that bailed out China´s largest banks in the 1990s. But that will not help, if the current fiscal dilemmas for local governments are not solved, writes financial analyst Sara Hsu in the Diplomat.Read More →

The formal arrest and expected trial of Zhou Yongkang means a change in how China is dealing with its ruling elite, tells political scientist Victor Shih in the International Business Times. “No leader is safe from corruption investigation… We see now the rule by law.”Read More →

Slowing economic growth, uncertainty about measurement tools being used and promises by the government for reform. Those are just three elements making assessing China´s GDP for the coming years tough. Financial analyst Sara Hsu gives it a go at the Diplomat.Read More →

Officially sustainability is high on China´s political agenda. But mountain leveling and other unsustainable practices to facilitate building of new cities for the country´s new urbanites borders to craziness, writes urbanization expert Sara Hsu in the Diplomat.Read More →