The following press releases and media reports about Chinese companies were carried on June 2. To view a full article or story, click on the link next to the headline.
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LeTV’s (Shenzhen: 300104) Leshi Mobile Raises $400 Mln Series A Funding (English article)
Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) Weighs China App Store, Offers Smartphone Subsidies (Chinese article)
Silver Lake Leads $500 Mln Investment In Travel Site Qunar (Nasdaq: QUNR) (GlobeNewswire)
KFC (NYSE: YUM) Sues Chinese Companies For Online Rumors About Its Food (English article)
JD.com (Nasdaq: JD) Launches Japanese Mall Imported Goods Platform (GlobeNewswire)
Bottom line: The latest EU anti-dumping probe into Chinese solar panels is likely to find that manufacturers violated a previous agreement, which could result in new punitive tariffs by the end of this year.
EU launches new probe into Chinese solar panels
In a move that will surprise to no one, the European Union has formally launched a probe into Chinese solar panel makers who are being accused by European rivals of violating a landmark agreement that averted anti-dumping tariffs. I should really stop using the word “landmark” to describe the 2013 deal between the Chinese panel makers and EU that avoided a trade war. In fact, it’s becoming increasingly obvious that a better word to describe the deal would be “foolish”, since it appears many of the Chinese panel makers never really intended to follow the spirit of the agreement to begin with. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Effects of the short-seller attack on Vipshop are likely to die down soon and the stock should stabilize, while Jiayuan is likely to get bought out for a figure close to its latest stock price following receipt of a new bid.
VIP short seller attack continues
New developments are occurring in 2 stories involving less-followed Chinese Internet companies, led by a fresh assault in an ongoing short-seller attack that is eroding shares of discount e-commerce site Vipshop(NYSE: VIPS). Meantime, shares of online matchmaking site Jiayuan (Nasdaq: DATE) have soared, after it announced it has received new buy-out bids for the company. That development would come nearly 2 months after Jiayuan received an initial buy-out offer that some complained vastly undervalued the company. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Priceline’s new China foray with Ctrip will get off to a positive start, but will run into problems and ultimately collapse due both sides’ inability to gain much from the partnership.
Ctrip boosts Priceline alliance
Just days after global online travel giant Expedia (Nasdaq: EXPE) announced its withdrawal from China, rival Priceline (Nasdaq: PCLN) is moving in the other direction with a significant boost to its partnership with local sector leader Ctrip (Nasdaq: CTRP). I’ve previously been quite skeptical of this particular partnership, after previous similar tie-ups failed due to the fiercely independent nature of Ctrip’s top management. I’m still quite skeptical, though a string of other major tie-ups by Ctrip recently seem to show it’s realizing it needs to be more flexible to fend off the growing threat from fast-rising local rival Qunar (Nasdaq: QUNR). Read Full Post…
The following press releases and media reports about Chinese companies were carried on May 30-June 2. To view a full article or story, click on the link next to the headline.
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IMAX China Files For HK IPO, Betting on Booming Film Demand (English article)
Ctrip (Nasdaq: CTRP) Says Outage Due to Staff Error, Not Hack (English article)
Solarworld (Frankfurt: SWVK) Gains EU Probes of Possible China Duty Evasion (English article)
Alibaba (NYSE: BABA), Yahoo Japan (Tokyo: 4689) To Open Tmall Japan Pavillion (Chinese article)
Vipshop (NYSE: VIPS) Comes Under New Short Seller Attack, Shares Drop 6 Pct (Chinese article)
Bottom line: Thursday’s hacking attack on Ctrip brings a sour end to its week of major new tie-ups, but isn’t too unexpected for a company of its size and should have a relatively limited impact on its operations and reputation.
Ctrip shut down by hackers
I’ve been writing a lot about leading online travel agent Ctrip (Nasdaq: CTRP) these last few days after it signed a couple of major deals, so it seems fitting that we end the week with news of a major hacking attack that took the company offline for most of Thursday. I’m a longtime user of Ctrip and am generally a big fan of the company, whose good management and focus on its core travel business have allowed it to maintain its market-leading position for a decade despite numerous challenges.
Against that backdrop, this hacker attack seems like a relatively minor issue, though one that could be potentially worrisome as it exposes one of Ctrip’s biggest vulnerabilities. Then again, Ctrip is certainly not the only company to come under such attacks, and many much larger and more experienced western giants like US retailer Target (NYSE: TGT) and Hollywood studio Sony Pictures (Tokyo: 6753) came under much higher-profile and more damaging outside assaults last year. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: Alibaba’s technical glitch at Alipay, the launch of its new bank and use of its Taobao platform to auction of bad loans reflect its growing clout in financial services, as it attempts to build up its Ant Financial unit for a future IPO.
Technical glitch interrupts Alipay
E-commerce leader Alibaba (NYSE: BABA) is in a trio of finance-related headlines, spotlighting its growing bet on financial services that could be a huge growth area as Beijing opens the sector to private investment. One headline has seen Alibaba get official permission from its home province to open a bank, after it became one of the first 3 entities to receive private banking licenses under a pilot program by Beijing.
The second headline has seen the company’s popular Alipay electronic payments service experience technical problems that cut off access for 2 hours earlier this week, prompting it to quickly say that no accounts were compromised. The final news bit comes in a larger story about China’s growing bad asset crisis, which will see the nation’s top bad asset management company use Alibaba’s Taobao marketplace to auction off some of those assets. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: The presence of the CEOs of Microsoft and Intel at a Lenovo tech fest in Beijing represent the struggles that all 3 former PC giants are facing, and how each is looking to China in a bid to reverse its slide.
Lenovo, Microsoft, Intel CEOs share stage in Beijing
It’s not often that anyone uses the term Wintel anymore, which refers to the duopoly of Microsoft’s (Nasdaq: MSFT) Windows operating system (OS) and central microprocessing chips from Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) that dominated the computing world for decades. But Wintel was center stage this week in Beijing, in a rare case where the CEOs of both Microsoft and Intel shared the stage with the CEO of Lenovo (HKEx: 992), the world’s largest PC maker, which was holding a bash to launch a wide range of new products.
Lenovo has been steadily hyping this event that finally took place on Thursday, where it unveiled a wide range of new products like a dual-screen smart watch and laser projector smartphone, all of which looked interesting but not too exceptional. I wasn’t planning on writing about the event at all for that reason, until I spotted the photo featuring Lenovo CEO Yang Yuanqing taking a selfie of himself with Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Intel CEO Brian Krzanich at the Lenovo Tech World event in Beijing. Read Full Post…
The following press releases and media reports about Chinese companies were carried on May 29. To view a full article or story, click on the link next to the headline.
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China’s Top Online Travel Agent Ctrip (Nasdaq: CTRP) Taken Offline By Hackers (English article)
BOC Hong Kong (HKEx: 2388) Said to Narrow Bids for $6.8 Bln Nanyang Bank (English article)
Alibaba’s (NYSE: BABA) Online Bank Secures Launch Approval (English article)
HK Securities Regulator Confirms Investigation of Hanergy (HKEx: 566) (Chinese article)
Bottom line: Twitter’s growing pursuit of business from Chinese advertisers shows it is watching the market for a potential future entry, while a new equity tie-up could see Didi Kuaidi’s hired car services launch on Weibo later this year.
Twitter chases China advertisers
Social networking (SNS) pioneer Twitter (NYSE: TWTR) and its Chinese clone WeiboCorp (Nasdaq: WB) are both in the China headlines today, each taking gambles on different parts of the market. After previously saying that China isn’t a market where it can do business, the original Twitter has quietly begun to court local advertisers, even as its actual service remains blocked in the country. Meantime, Weibo, which rose to prominence after Twitter was first blocked in China in 2009, has announced a relatively large new investment in local hired car services leader Didi Kuaidi. Read Full Post…
Bottom line: BYD’s latest fund raising will test investor patience as its EV business struggles, while Warburg Pincus will continue to cash out of Car Inc to take advantage of its soaring stock.
Warburg sells down Car Inc stake
A couple of cash-raising stores are in the headlines for 2 car-related companies, led by the news that Warren Buffett-backed new energy car maker BYD (HKEx: 1211; Shenzhen: 002594) is planning a new share sale as it gets weighed down by a big debt and slow sales for its electric vehicles (EVs). Meantime, Warburg Pincus is selling down its stake in car rental specialist Car Inc (HKEx: 0699), following the end of a lock-up period after its IPO last year.
The BYD saga is easily the more interesting of the 2 stories, showing the company’s dreams for making big profits from the emerging market for EVs are moving ahead far more slowly than it had originally hoped. That reality has forced BYD to look to various measures to raise billions of dollars in cash over the last year to keep its operations going. In the process, Warren Buffett’s stake has slowly crept down from an original 10 percent to a current 9 percent. Everyone is watching closely to see if the billionaire investor may ultimately dump his stake completely. Read Full Post…
