Trade

  • Cambodia: Last year, the export value of bicycles increased by more than 70% year-on-year. According to Cambodia’s “Cambodia Daily” recently reported that in 2021, Cambodia’s bicycle exports will exceed 560 million US dollars, a year-on-year increase of more than 70%. At present, Cambodia has five large-scale foreign bicycle assembly plants, all of which are located in Bavet City, Chai Zhen Province, on the border with Vietnam.
  • Rebar: Dominica made a final ruling on anti-dumping sunset review. A final ruling on anti-dumping sunset review was made on rebars for construction originating in China, and a 43% anti-dumping duty was imposed.

Industry

  • In 2021, India, Brazil, Russia, Argentina and Mexico make up the top five countries with the fastest growing e-commerce retail in the world, according to a research report by the Mexican Online Sales Association.
  • During the Covid-19 outbreak, price hikes for high-end consumer goods have become the norm. Following the price increases of brands such as Gucci, Hermès and Chanel, from February 16, LV, a brand under the French high-end consumer goods company LVMH, has raised prices globally. This is its fifth price increase in the past year. In this round of price increases, the price of individual luxury goods has increased by up to 20%, or will continue to increase. Bain & Company reports that global luxury goods sales will increase by 13%-15% in 2021, which is still 9%-11% lower than 2019 levels.
  • Since 2022, many retail giants have started the “price increase model”. Unilever such as PepsiCo, McDonald’s, Kellogg’s, Procter & Gamble, etc. has announced price increases before, and since February 16, the prices of many Starbucks products, including American coffee and latte coffee, are 1-2 yuan higher than before.
  • Commodity price movements have remained strong since 2022. As of the end of January, the CRB index, which shows the composite trend of commodity prices, was up 46% year-on-year, the largest gain since comparable data became available in 1995. Crude oil and many other commodities are rising. Among the 22 major commodities that are sensitive to the economy, the prices of 9 commodities rose by more than 50% annually, among which coffee rose 91%, cotton rose 58%, and aluminum rose 53%. More and more raw materials that are closely related to people’s daily life have begun to rise in price.
  • Counterpoint: In the fourth quarter of 2021, China’s smartphone shipments fell by 11% year-on-year. Among them, Apple’s market share ranked first and reached a record 21%; Honor’s market share reached 17%, ranking second for the first time, doubling year-on-year. Vivo, OPPO and Xiaomi ranked third, fourth and fifth respectively.
  • Battery Alliance: In January, the total installed capacity of power batteries in China was 16.2GWh, an increase of 86.9% year-on-year and a month-on-month decrease of 38.3%, achieving a significant year-on-year increase. The loadings of ternary batteries and lithium iron phosphate batteries were 7.3GWh and 8.9GWh, up 35.2% and 172.7% year-on-year, respectively, and down 34.0% and 41.0% month-on-month.
  • Korea Tourism Organization: The number of foreign tourists who visited South Korea for tourism purposes last year was about 210,000, down 98.5% from before the epidemic. In terms of nationality of foreign tourists visiting South Korea, the United States has the most tourists with 70,000, followed by the Philippines (33,000), Indonesia (16,000), China (15,000), and Myanmar (15,000).
  • International flight bookings in Southeast Asia surged. The latest data from Skyscanner shows a sharp rise in bookings for international flights to Southeast Asian countries that have opened their borders in January. Among them, passengers from Britain, the United States, Germany and other places saw an increase of 19% to 300% in economy class air ticket bookings for Southeast Asian destinations in January compared with December last year.
  • Gamma data: In January, the actual sales revenue of China’s mobile game (mobile game) market was 22.240 billion yuan, a month-on-month increase of 20.25% and a year-on-year increase of 17.76%. Because many games launched Spring Festival activities on the eve of the Spring Festival, and at the same time, a number of new games were launched, which stimulated the growth of turnover.

China

  • China’s annual surplus was US$315.7 billion, and the trade deficit declined. The State Administration of Foreign Exchange announced that in 2021, China’s current account will have a surplus of US$315.7 billion, accounting for 1.8% of its gross domestic product (GDP) in the same period, continuing to remain in a reasonable and balanced range. The trade deficit in services was US$97.7 billion, down 33% from 2020.
  • Bureau of Statistics: In January, the CPI rose by 0.4% month-on-month and 0.9% year-on-year, a decrease of 0.6 percentage points from the previous month. In addition, pork prices fell by 41.6% year-on-year, and the decline expanded by 4.9 percentage points. In January, the PPI decreased by 0.2% month-on-month and increased by 9.1% year-on-year, a decrease of 1.2 percentage points from the previous month. The scissors gap further narrowed by 0.6 percentage points to 8.2%.
  • State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission: In 2021, the coal output of central enterprises will break through the 1 billion ton mark, setting a record high. In 2021, the annual power generation of central power generation enterprises will reach 4.95 trillion kWh, a year-on-year increase of 10.2%, accounting for 64.6% of the national power generation. , 5.3 billion kWh of electricity.
  • SCO: The total trade value of member countries has increased by nearly 100 times in the past 20 years, and the proportion of the total global trade value has increased from 5.4% in 2001 to 17.5% in 2020. China has become the largest trading partner of Uzbekistan and Pakistan, and the second largest trading partner of Russia and India. (PS. the organization details, click here>>)
  • Beijing Municipal Education Commission: Recently issued the “Notice on Further Doing a Good Job in the Filing and Management of Educational Mobile Internet Applications” (draft for comments), education mobile applications for preschool children’s training will all stop running. Non-discipline training education mobile applications shall not provide and disseminate bad learning methods such as “photographing and searching for questions” that inert the thinking ability of primary and secondary school students and affect students’ independent thinking.

Company

  • South Korea: Raise Google’s fines for Android systems. According to a report by Yonhap News Agency on February 15, the Korea Fair Trade Commission said it raised the fine imposed on Google to about 1.19 billion yuan for imposing the Android operating system on smartphone manufacturers.
  • Evergreen’s shipping performance exceeded 50 billion for 4 consecutive months. Recently, Evergreen Shipping released its January results. Consolidated revenue reached NT$56.841 billion, an annual increase of 99.9% and a monthly increase of 8.8%. The revenue has stabilized at NT$50 billion for 4 consecutive months. The second-highest record of NT$52.7 billion rose sharply by about 7.8%.
  • The profits of the world’s major oil giants have risen sharply. The world’s major oil majors have released their 2021 financial reports. Exxon Mobil’s net profit was $23 billion, compared with a net loss of $22.4 billion in the previous year; Shell’s adjusted net profit was $19.3 billion, an increase of about 297.9% year-on-year; Total’s adjusted net profit was $18.1 billion, which is 2020 4.4 times.
  • Luckin opened a total of about 360 new stores in January. The internal letter issued by Ruixing Coffee Chairman and CEO Guo Jin to Ruixing’s 20,000 employees shows that in January this year, Ruixing opened a total of about 360 new stores, setting a new record for the total number of stores opened by Ruixing in a single month. The transaction volume of stores during the Spring Festival Golden Week was three times that of the same period last year.

World

  • European Commission: It will launch the “Secure Constellation” plan to build an Internet based on satellite communications covering all of Europe and parts of Africa. The plan will launch 20,000 low-orbit satellites over the next ten years, with a total investment of about 6 billion euros. It is reported that the plan will compete with Amazon and SpaceX.
  • London’s public transport fares will rise by an average of 5% from March to make up for transport financial losses during the pandemic. The price increase was the largest in more than a decade.
  • Vietnam: Publishes export targets for timber and non-timber forest products. It is planned that by 2025, the export value of wood products and non-timber forest products will reach 18 billion to 20 billion US dollars.
  • Thailand: Set up five categories of target industries for foreign investment. The goal is to attract 1 trillion baht of investment in five targeted industries, including automobiles, electronics, and pharmaceuticals, within 1 to 2 years.
  • Saudi Arabia: Launches bid for new large-scale mine, Al Khunayqiyah. It is reported that Saudi Arabia provides preferential conditions such as a 30% reduction in royalties and a five-year tax holiday for mineral development companies.
  • Indonesia: Suspend the operations of more than 1,000 coal and other miners. Indonesia has suspended operations of more than 1,000 miners of coal, tin and other minerals after failing to submit a work plan for 2022.
  • India announced a ban on downloading 54 Chinese apps. The Indian government has banned the download of 54 mobile phone applications (APPs), many of which are products of major Chinese technology companies Tencent, Alibaba and NetEase, citing “a threat to the privacy and security of Indians”. This is the fifth round of the Indian government’s ban on Chinese apps.
  • Russia’s annual foreign trade surplus increased by 90% year-on-year. According to data from the Russian Federal Customs Service, Russia’s foreign trade surplus in 2021 will increase by 0.9 times year-on-year, reaching approximately US$197.3 billion. Among them, Russia’s exports reached US$493.3 billion, a year-on-year increase of 45.7%; imports were US$296.1 billion, an increase of 26.5% over 2020.
  • Brazil’s inflation rate is the highest since 2016. Recently, according to data released by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics, in January, Brazil’s national broad consumer price index (IPCA) was 0.54%. Although the inflation rate has slowed down for three consecutive months, this is the highest year-on-year since 2016. data.
  • Israel’s economic growth remained strong at 7 percent, driven by high-tech industries and the normalization of relations with some Middle Eastern countries.