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Andy Xie
Dr Andy Xie is a Shanghai-based independent economist specialising in China and Asia, and writes, speaks and consults on global economics and financial markets. He joined Morgan Stanley in 1997 and was managing director and head of the firm’s Asia-Pacific economics team until 2006. Prior to that he spent two years with Macquarie Bank in Singapore, where he was an associate director in corporate finance. He also spent five years as an economist with the World Bank. He was voted one of the 50 most influential persons in finance by Bloomberg magazine in 2013.
Dr Andy Xie is a Shanghai-based independent economist specialising in China and Asia, and writes, speaks and consults on global economics and financial markets. He joined Morgan Stanley in 1997 and was managing director and head of the firm’s Asia-Pacific economics team until 2006. Prior to that he spent two years with Macquarie Bank in Singapore, where he was an associate director in corporate finance. He also spent five years as an economist with the World Bank. He was voted one of the 50 most influential persons in finance by Bloomberg magazine in 2013.
The rise of the sodium-ion battery promises to supercharge a green energy transition that will help level the global playing field.
Amid an artificial intelligence bubble and a strained weapons supply, the US is finding out how much leverage China has over its economy.
AI is being sold as the latest tech frontier and a key area of US-China competition, but one day the money inflating the bubble will run out.
By increasing investment in renewables, China’s economy stands to benefit from more sustainable growth rates and improved terms of trade.
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Despite a brief reprieve for the stock market, trade tensions and weaknesses in the US economy still threaten global financial stability.
With the US market largely closed to it, Beijing cannot neglect the wider social impact of couples’ decisions about whether to have children.
China has all the cards and the confidence; but for the US, the likely outcome is the bursting of the US financial bubble and the dollar’s demise.
US stocks bounced back on DeepSeek doubts. But it’s the real deal and it threatens assumptions of US AI dominance that underpin the market.
Inflationary pressure and a growing deficit would turn the US into a liquidity-sucking force.
When future historians look back on China’s rise, Trump’s trade war might well be viewed as having helped to prevent a Chinese crisis.
Trump’s proposed tariffs on US imports would drive inflation and squeeze middle powers, but is that all part of the plan?
China’s declining demand for fossil fuels and increased clean-energy capacity could usher in a new shift in global wealth distribution.
The Fed has been running a bubble economy for a long time. A rate cut would help asset prices to stay high, which is key to the US model.
Stimulus right after a deflated bubble risks a debt mire. Better to invest in China’s green tech and harness global talent to ensure prosperity.
As the US steps up support for national industries and expands tariffs on China, its high-income allies could lose their pricing power.
China has a much better chance of nudging the European Union on free trade. Beijing should hit US cars with stiff tariffs to send a warning signal to Brussels.
Complaints of Chinese overcapacity and dumping may be useful in justifying US, EU subsidies and trade barriers but China’s success is really due to its innovation and scale.
Macroeconomic stimulus provides only a temporary boost. China is no longer a bubbly market full of speculators paying stupid money for overpriced products. Businesses must change to prosper.
The surge in Japan’s stock market looks out of place and unsustainable in an economy with a shrinking population and falling real wages. Chinese investors shifting money to Japan in the hope of catching the wave should be wary of being left behind when this bubble pops – possibly this year.
Next month’s NPC meeting is unlikely to produce any dramatic changes in China’s monetary and fiscal policy or a return of massive stimulus. Instead, policymakers are expected to continue focusing on technological development and attempts to make domestic firms the core of supply chains.
As its economy matures and becomes more competitive from battling the severe headwinds of recent times, China should have the confidence to let its currency reflect its true strength.
Beijing is right to hold back on coming to the rescue of the property sector, which would reinflate the real estate bubble. If it must use stimulus, it should spend a few percentages of GDP a year on a solar energy push, which could make the country energy and food independent.
Given the US bubble economy, a rising fiscal deficit and foolish behaviour of markets, the Federal Reserve faces a tough balancing act. It has already had to walk back some dovish statements, and further policy mistakes risk damage to the entire global economy.
China is using its downturn to deflate bubbles and raise productivity while the US is doing the opposite – feeding the Bernanke bubble and hoping for an AI cure for falling productivity
The effects of war and inflation could send US financial markets into a tailspin, forcing China to completely ‘unpeg’ from the dollar – which could then collapse.
Amid rising dollar risks, Brics states should integrate their currency and bond markets, and tax dollar transactions to promote local currency use.
In an era of deglobalisation, disinflation in China won’t help to moderate price rises in the rest of the world, as long as the drivers of inflation – including a massive monetary overhang – hold strong. More to the point, inflation will last for as long as confidence in the US dollar holds.
China’s current challenges are the result of misallocation of resources in its boom years; the troubles in the property sector are a symptom of this , not the cause. Competition and productivity are the main forces behind today’s deflationary pressure, and this is a positive development.
China is gently deflating its property bubble and absorbing overcapacities as it waits for demand to return. This could take a long time but China has the luxury to dither.
