It is not Hong Kong protests or the trade war, China’s leaders fear most, but hogs hit by African swine fever and the rising pork prices, says political analyst Victor Shih at Phys.org. An estimated 40 percent of its pigs have been killed already and massive reserves of frozen pork released on the stretched markets.Read More →

China’s currency, the yuan, is on a downward track, not because of government action, but is a market reaction on the US tariffs on Chinese goods, says investment guru Jim Rogers. Washington has to blame itself for the weakening yuan, he tells in the Stocknewsbrief.com.Read More →

Western media too easily assume the protests in Hong Kong are supported by many mainland Chinese. Wrong, says author Zhang Lijia. There is a wide dived between mainland Chinese and Hongkongnese, and that is not only because of the media censorship in the mainland, she adds at the South China Morning Post.Read More →

US President Donald Trump wants US companies to fight China, but they rather flee for greener pastures not to their home countries, says financial analyst Sara Hsu at the ChinaUSFacus. But some might decide to swap countries too early, she warns.Read More →

If some US politicians hope the trade war between China and the US might undermine Xi Jinping’s domestic power base, they are on the wrong track, says political analyst Victor Shih at US-China Economic and Security Review Commission hearings at the US Congress, according to the South China Morning Post.Read More →

It’s the economy, stupid, says China commentator Kaiser Kuo in his masterclass for Quora. Journalist and blogger Cory Doctorow reviews his masterclass ” on contemporary Chinese politics, authoritarianism, liberalism and dissidence” for BoingBoing.Read More →

The trade war damages both US and China’s economy, and global trade. Financial and political analyst Victor Shih, Ho Miu Lam Chair associate professor of political economy at UC San Diego and author of the forthcoming “Economic Shocks and Authoritarian Stability,” gives an overview of the damage in the Los Angeles Times.Read More →