This column was previously published in L’Express on 21st April 2022 The new environment in China is the result of several concurrent crises… that Beijing refuses to recognize. The election of President Xi Jinping for his third term of office next autumn could raise some hopes of a rapid awareness…

This column was previously published in L’Express on 24th march 2022 The National People’s Congress has produced a recovery plan replacing “common prosperity” by economic stability. This new direction takes no account of the three problems facing Beijing. The Communist Party’s annual “two assemblies” event ended on 11th March and…

This column was previously published in L’Express on 24th february 2022 As the collapse of the giant developer threatens to spread to the whole of the real estate sector, Beijing is banking more than ever on the export industry moving upmarket, to the detriment of the service sector. The worst thing about the Omicron variant is that it is highly contagious, and China is finding out that the same goes for real estate crises. The collapse of the giant developer Evergrande — which even a command economy…

This column was first published in L’Opinion on 23 march 2022 So many lies have been told about the reasons for the war in Ukraine that our democratic societies must question themselves about their own climb-downs and cowardice when faced with the truth. “In war […] there are no winners”…

Rather than prioritizing strong growth, the Chinese government is giving priority to a new financial rigor. A new hand for Europe to play against. This column (“Lettre d’Asie”) was previously published on 17th february 2022 in L’Opinion With this Chinese New Year under the sign of the tiger, will China…

This colum was first published in L’Express on 23rd December 2021 Under pressure from China, the “fragrant harbor” is undergoing a significant change in status, going from an international financial center to being a regional “supercenter”. “I don’t care!” was the response given by Carrie Lam, Hong Kong’s chief executive, to the city’s main financial lobby, half of whose members announced the beginning of a wave of sackings made necessary by international travel restrictions. It…

This column was first published in L’Opinion on 5th january 2022 An extended slowdown of the Chinese economy would obviously impact on the whole world. But China could now also contribute to world stagflation in the 2020s. The Chinese leaders are undoubtedly only too happy to say goodbye to 2021, an annus horribilis that combined the lack of an effective anti-Covid vaccine, the bursting of the real estate bubble, a stock exchange crash, a sluggish birth…

This column was first published in L’Opinion on 8th december 2021 The world is never going to be the same again as it was in 2019. The past history of pandemics suggests that we should expect major geopolitical changes. Multinationals will have to rethink several aspects of the way in…

This column was first published in L’Express on 18th November 2021 Foreign companies can continue to invest in China, but Beijing may well put the damper on their ambitions at any moment. Is China still investable? When education in China was, to all intents and purposes, nationalized last summer, the…