This column was previously published in l’Opinion on october 5th 2023. Europe is no longer prepared to accept the imbalances of the Chinese ecosystem, which has been responsible for a €400 billion deficit in the European balance of trade. It remains to be seen whether it will be able to…

This column was previously published in l’Opinion on august 31st 2023. The West is wrong to speculate on the possibility of a stimulus plan, for this could only remedy a cyclical economic crisis. Today, China finds itself facing a structural crisis in its balance sheet, to which its response will…

Column published in l’Opinion as part of the summer series “The odyssey of artificial intelligence”. This is the 5th episode. During the 2010s, China was certain of its technological superiority, performing most impressively in fields such as quantum computing. The announcement of the arrival of ChatGPT3 heralds the end to Chinese self-assurance. Generally speaking, the 7th of October 2022 was a date that went unnoticed in Europe, but it will go down in history as the Pearl Harbor of the 21st century…

This column was previously published in L’Opinion on july 19th 2023 China is speeding up the process of breaking away from the West, forcing European companies to find systematic ways of reducing the risks to their operations there. History is speeding up: macro-economists predicted that China’s growth rate would slow down to 2% by the end of the decade, in fact, that is already happening in 2023. Rather than believe the official GNP figures, which are themselves…

“Letter from Asia” published in L’Opinion, 28th june 2023 President Xi is focusing his energies on the international stage, but, given the lack of any real recovery, he should be questioning the soundness of his new economic model. Even the Party’s official propaganda now openly admits that the recovery is…

“Letter from Asia” published in L’Opinion, 24th May 2023. Western companies in China must deploy all their skills of perception in order to get a clear insight into China’s paradoxes. 2023 is the year in which to take decisions that will have a crucial effect on the coming decade. It is quite an achievement to gain clear insight at the age of 10! Congratulations to the editorial staff of L’Opinion, whose readers will certainly need to be clear-sighted in analysing the recent developments in China. In order to do so…

This column has been previously published in Les Echos on 11th april 2023 Geopolitics has re-entered the world of business with a jolt, causing them to reverse their peacetime benchmarks. Two eras have just ended — ones to which we had become dangerously accustomed. The first was a 30-year period in the West during which the hope was entertained of westernizing the whole world. The second was…

This column has been previously published in L’Opinion on 12th april 2023 Beijing has forgotten that the history of the 20th century teaches us that democracies lose out at first but end up as the winners when their governments tell their people the truth. President Emmanuel Macron should take comfort from the fact that he is not the first — nor will be the last — Westerner to come back empty-handed from a trip to Beijing. To hope that President Xi Jinping…

“Letter from Asia” published in L’Opinion, 14th February 2023. The world has to get used to a less than 5% growth rate for the Chinese economy, which is based on development in the tech sector but limited by increasing government control. The main thing that we learned from the People’s National Congress that has just taken place in Beijing was not the forecast of relatively little growth in 2023, expected to be only 5%. Rather, it was what President Xi said about…