China Market Intelligence

As China’s local governments concluded their annual Two Sessions meetings last month, local GDP targets and personnel changes have been announced. These meetings are forerunners to the national Two Sessions, China’s annual parliamentary meetings which are scheduled to begin on March 4 and provide a window to the national economic outlook and forthcoming policies.

Despite bilateral tensions, years of escalating trade restrictions, and lockdowns in China for much of 2022, US-China trade in goods increased 5.2 percent in 2022 to a record high of $690.6 billion. Growth in trade with China is part of a broader wave of record US trade with the world.

Many companies are preparing senior executive travel to China for the first time in several years now that China has eliminated quarantine requirements on inbound travelers. To better understand the different factors companies are considering in planning executive travel to China, USCBC conducted a short survey to help members benchmark against each other’s plans.

US-China relations are at a difficult and highly uncertain inflection point. Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of State Antony Blinken participated in the Munich Security Conference February 17 to 19. Secretary Blinken and President Xi Jinping’s top foreign policy adviser, Wang Yi, reportedly had a tense private meeting during which both sides drew lines in the sand and did not appear to de-escalate the balloon incident as was hoped.

Chinese investments throughout the United States are under increasing scrutiny, with once uncontroversial projects now receiving national attention. A growing number of state and local regulators are racing to create new tools to review and block such investments due to political and national security concerns.

This article updates USCBC’s December 2022 FAQs on China’s Cross-Border Data Transfer (CBDT) Regulation with new insights into company progress and likely enforcement patterns as the March 1 deadline approaches. This process is required only for companies seeking to transfer certain types or volumes of data outside of China.

It has been two months since China lifted its three-year-long zero-COVID policy. While hospitals nationwide remain overstretched with patients suffering severe symptoms, the majority of the population has recovered from the first wave of infections and is back on the road for the Chinese New Year.

During the 118th Congress, all eyes will be on the newly established Select Committee on Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party. Still, it is important to note that the select committee will not have any legislative authority, and that the  standing committees will still hold full power to craft, introduce, and mark up legislation.

China’s state-owned enterprises (SOEs) are an integral part of the country’s economic system, and their intimate ties to the government make them a key vehicle through which policymakers can influence economic outcomes. As such, SOEs are expected to play a critical role in China’s economic recovery, resiliency initiatives, and other plans such as decarbonization and dual circulation.

More than three years after the first COVID-19 case was reported, China has finally made a decisive u-turn, veering away from the zero-COVID regime and toward co-existing with the virus. On December 7, 2022, the National Health Commission (NHC) released 10 measures that effectively dismantled its stringent requirements.