4 d. ago China's 2025 soybean imports hit record, fuelled by S. American purchases

China's 2025 soybean imports hit record, fuelled by S. American purchases  Reuters

Events

1 week ago Korean peninsula arms race is heating up. How will China react in 2026?

As the new year unfolds, China finds itself grappling with strategic pressures fuelled by two US treaty allies at its doorstep – Japan and South Korea. In the second of a two-part series, Seong Hyeon Choi looks at how competing pressures in the Korean peninsula may complicate China’s security calculus. Read the first part here. In 2025, there was a major shift in China’s security environment relating to the Korean peninsula, as the North grew more open in its push for nuclear weapons and the...

Politics

2 w. ago Hong Kong to boost tech, financial services integration during AI boom: Paul Chan

Hong Kong’s finance chief has pledged to further integrate financial services with technology innovation to foster a thriving ecosystem, following a surge in investor interest in artificial intelligence-related stocks during the first trading day of the year. Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po also stressed on Sunday the importance of Hong Kong’s role as an international capital market in fuelling the growth of mainland China’s frontier tech firms using the city’s funding and liquidity. “We...

Politics

3 w. ago Hard work and long hours fuelled China’s rise. Now, it mulls the benefits of longer breaks

Whether in China’s urban centres or its remote rural areas, Christmas is not typically celebrated with the fanfare seen in the West. On the mainland, December 25 is not even a public holiday, with the lion’s share of enthusiasm reserved for the traditional Lunar New Year period beginning in January or February. Zhang Li, who lives in a pastoral section of the Inner Mongolia autonomous region in the country’s north, was no exception. But this year things have changed, thanks in part to a new...

Politics

3 w. ago Hard work, long hours fuelled China’s rise. Now, it weighs longer breaks

Hard work, long hours fuelled China’s rise. Now, it weighs longer breaks  South China Morning Post

Politics

4 w. ago China shoppers swap boutiques for bargains, fuelling US$30 billion luxury resale boom

At a shopping centre in Shenzhen’s coastal business district, a store’s entrance feels more like a security checkpoint than a retail gateway. Customers check their bags, don white silk gloves, and pass through a gate. Beyond the checkpoint, which also seems incongruent with the outer facade resembling a typical multi-brand fashion shop, lies a 2,000-square-metre (21,527-sq-ft) showroom. Inside, luxury handbags are not displayed under artful lighting. Instead, they are tightly arranged in...

Economics