Signage at the Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. booth at the Smart China Expo in Chongqing, China, on Monday, Sept. 4, 2023.
Qilai Shen | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Alibaba needs to be “user first” and “AI-driven,” new CEO Eddie Wu told employees on Tuesday, as he laid out the strategic priorities for the Chinese tech giant.
Wu, who is just three days into the job as Alibaba chief executive, called for the e-commerce firm to “adopt a start-up mindset” as he looks to steer the company back to growth following one of the most tumultuous times in its 24-year history.
“Times are changing, and so must Alibaba! As the world progresses, Alibaba needs to evolve even faster!,” Wu said in a letter to employees that was seen by CNBC.
Wu said Alibaba’s two main strategic focuses will be “user first” and “AI-driven.” The company will “reinforce” its strategic investments in three areas.
The first it calls “technology-driven internet platforms.” Wu said that Alibaba’s business should “seek out the most open and collaborative relationships,” even with competitors. This is a different approach from Alibaba which has tended to try to keep users within its ecosystem of products.
Wu also touted the need to invest in artificial intelligence. Alibaba’s cloud unit has tried to position itself as a leader in AI inside China as it looks to reignite growth in the business.
“Each of our businesses generates massive numbers of use cases; therefore, we must transform these use cases into applications for AI technology, driving breakthrough user experience and business models through technology innovation,” Wu said.
“If we don’t keep up with the changes of the AI era, we will be displaced.”
Alibaba Cloud has its large language model called Tongyi Qianwen, released earlier this year. An LLM is an AI model trained on huge amounts of data and underpins chatbot applications. It’s the same type of model that OpenAI’s ChatGPT is based on.
Wu also said Alibaba needs to continue to invest in “globalization.”
Alibaba will also look to promote younger talent. Within the next four years, the company will promote those born after 1985 and the 1990s “to form the core of our business management teams,” Wu said.
Energy analysts are warning of more gas market volatility and higher prices as Europe races to prepare for another winter heating season.
European gas markets have been constantly fluctuating in recent months, owing to extreme heat, maintenance at gas plants and, most recently, industrial action at major liquefied natural gas (LNG) facilities in Australia.
Workers at U.S. energy giant Chevron’s Gorgon and Wheatstone natural gas projects in Western Australia went on strike last week, after a protracted dispute over pay and job security. Work stoppages of up to 11 hours are scheduled to continue through to Thursday, at which point the action is poised to ramp up to a total strike of two weeks.
At present, no further talks are scheduled to resolve the dispute, exacerbating fears that a prolonged halt to production would squeeze global supplies.
Australia is a major player in the global LNG market — and even though most of its exports are destined for Japan, China and South Korea, disruption from the strikes is likely to result in Asia and Europe competing for LNG from other suppliers.
Gas markets are becoming riskier — gas and LNG prices are increasingly volatile and greatly affected by global factors.
Ana Maria Jaller-Makarewicz
Energy analyst at IEEFA
The front-month gas price at the Dutch Title Transfer Facility (TTF) hub, a European benchmark for natural gas trading, traded 1.4% higher on Tuesday morning at 36.3 euros ($38.91) per megawatt hour. The TTF contract rose to around 43 euros last month amid fears of strike action.
“The fear of an unbalanced gas supply and demand seesaw has dominated markets,” Ana Maria Jaller-Makarewicz, energy analyst at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, a U.S.-based think tank, said in a research note.
She said the combination of lower gas consumption and Europe filling up its storage facilities ahead of schedule had helped to prevent gas prices from skyrocketing to last summer’s extraordinary peak of 340 euros.
However, given the uncertainty over how the situation in Australia will unfold, Jaller-Makarewicz said Europe should brace itself for more volatility and an increase in prices.
“Gas markets are becoming riskier — gas and LNG prices are increasingly volatile and greatly affected by global factors,” Jaller-Makarewicz said.
“The uncertainty of future events that could affect gas supply makes it extremely difficult to predict how the supply and demand could be balanced and how much prices could escalate by. As seen in last year’s events in Europe, the only way that importing countries can mitigate that risk is by reducing their internal consumption,” she added.
The EU reached its target of filling gas storage facilities to a 90% capacity roughly 2 1/2 months ahead of its Nov. 1 deadline. It leaves the bloc in a relatively strong position to cope with the demands of the forthcoming winter heating season.
The latest data compiled by industry group Gas Infrastructure Europe shows that the EU’s overall storage levels are at an average of nearly 94% full.
The International Energy Agency, however, has warned that even full storage sites are “no guarantee” against market conditions through winter.
“Our simulations show that a cold winter, together with a full halt of Russian piped gas supplies to the European Union starting from 1 October 2023, could easily renew price volatility and market tensions,” the global energy watchdog said in its annual gas market report, published July 17.
The IEA’s warning comes as the 27-nation bloc continues to wean itself off Russian fossil fuel exports after the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Analysts at political consultancy Eurasia Group fear that “real disruptions” to European markets are possible, including Norwegian winter storm outages and a cut of the remaining Russian gas to Europe.
Christyan Malek, global head of energy strategy and head of EMEA oil and gas equity research at JPMorgan, said the situation in gas markets is “very volatile” and therefore tough to predict.
Malek said European gas markets appear to be pricing in both the buffer of Europe hitting its gas storage target ahead of schedule, and the risk that a particularly cold winter could lead to a “massive upswing” in price by year-end.
“As a house, we’re relatively bearish on gas prices,” Malek told CNBC’s “Street Signs Europe” on Monday.
“We’re at 95% storage by the end of the year, we’re 50% storage by March next year. What does that mean? It means that we’ve got a pretty good buffer,” Malek said, referring to Europe’s filling of its gas storage facilities.
“Now, if it gets really cold in winter … we do have a problem,” he added.
A new floating storage and regasification unit considered crucial to Italy’s energy independence arrived in Tuscany on March 19, 2023. The Golar Tundra project is a key part of Italy’s plan to reduce its reliance on Russian gas following the invasion of Ukraine.
Filippo Monteforte | Afp | Getty Images
While analysts said volatile market conditions are likely to keep traders feeling anxious, some believe the strikes in Australia are the only thing likely to keep prices buoyant in the months ahead.
Kaushal Ramesh, an analyst at Oslo-based Rystad Energy, said volatility returned to gas markets following the start of industrial action at major gas facilities in Australia.
“However, the potential impact of the strikes is likely the only bullish element in the near-term market, given we have now entered the pre-winter shoulder season and other indicators are bearish in both Europe and Asia,” Ramesh said in a research note published Monday.
JR Ching, chief financial officer at Yoma Strategic Holdings, discusses the conglomerate’s product portfolio and how its performance compares with that of other developers.
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi (R) shakes hand with International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva ahead of the G20 Leaders’ Summit at the Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi on September 9, 2023.
Evan Vucci | Afp | Getty Images
NEW DELHI — The Biden-led rail-to-sea economic corridor linking India with Middle Eastern and European countries should not be exclusionary and should engage in the spirit of an integrated world economy, according to the International Monetary Fund’s Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva.
At a time when supply chains are aligning along shifting global geopolitical lines, U.S. President Joe Biden’s initiative appears to be aimed at not only countering China’s influence in the energy-rich Middle East, but also Beijing’s decade-old Belt and Road global infrastructure initiative. A more fragmented global economy though, has limited global trade growth — which now lags global economic growth.
“If we want trade to be an engine of growth, then we have to create corridors and opportunities,” Georgieva told CNBC’s Martin Soong Sunday on the sidelines of the Group of 20 nations leaders’ summit in New Delhi.
“What is important is to do it for the benefit of everybody, and not for exclusion of others,” she said. “In that sense, I would encourage all countries working collaboratively with each other to do so in the spirit of integrated economy.”
At the leaders’ summit Saturday, Biden and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a plan to develop a network of railways and sea routes that will connect India, the European Union and Middle Eastern countries such as Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in “a transformative regional investment.”
The deal underscores not only the burgeoning partnership between India and U.S., but also their urgency and resolve in persuading the world they represent a more viable strategic proposition in facilitating the developmental needs of the Global South.
In reality, this Biden-backed economic corridor would add to existing infrastructure investment for the regions involved. The countries involved will meet within the next two months to develop and commit to an action plan with relevant timetables, which are all lacking at this point.
“In a world where we learned from Covid and the [Ukraine] war, that supply chains need to be reinforced, they need to be diversified, that connectivity matters tremendously,” Georgieva told CNBC in the exclusive interview.
“The more there is investment in infrastructure connectivity, the more there is a platform for trade among nations, the better for the countries involved, but also for the world economy because expansion of transportation links, communication links and trade have positive spillovers,” she added.
Her comments came at the end of the summit, where fierce Russian and Chinese opposition to references to the lingering war in Ukraine had almost derailed consensus on a joint communique that typically binds G20 member states.
In the Delhi Declaration that was eventually adopted Saturday, G20 nations pledged to protect the most vulnerable in the world by promoting equitable growth and enhancing macroeconomic and financial stability. Under Modi, India’s year-long presidency of the multilateral bloc of the world’s largest economies was focused on elevating the place of the Global South on the G20 agenda.
Multilateral bank reform was among the issues on the agenda, which included establishing a global framework to restructure sovereign debt, particularly for vulnerable developing economies.
The IMF warned the the economic recovery after a series of major shocks is slow and uneven, with growth prospects in the medium term at its weakest in decades in an environment of stubbornly high inflation, high interest rates and growing fragmentation.
“And I call on our members to strengthen the global financial safety net,” Georgieva separately said Sunday in a press release, released shortly after the G20 summit formally ended.
“Since the start of the pandemic, the IMF has injected $1 trillion in reserves and liquidity through lending to nearly 100 countries and the historic [special drawing rights] allocation; and I thank our members who have helped us reach the goal of channeling $100 billion to vulnerable countries,” she added.
The IMF is undergoing its 16th quota review that is scheduled to wrap up by year-end. The Fund conducts these reviews once every five years to assess its ability to meet the needs of member states’ balance of payments financing needs, and to adjust members’ quota to reflect changes in their relative positions in the world economy.
“To make the global economy stronger and more resilient in a more shock-prone world, it is vital to reach an agreement to increase the IMF’s quota resources before the end of the year and secure the needed resources for the Fund’s interest-free support to the poorest countries through the Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust,” Georgieva added in the statement.
Correction: This story has been updated with the correct reference for the acronym SDR.
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi (2L) addresses the opening session of the G20 Leaders’ Summit at the Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi on September 9, 2023.
Ludovic Marin | Afp | Getty Images
NEW DELHI — The Group of 20 nations on Saturday overcame differences in references to the war in Ukraine, reaching a consensus on a joint declaration that paves the way for frameworks on debt resolution, and country-specific climate financing solutions among other pledges aimed at enhancing development in the Global South.
In an 83-paragraph joint communique aimed at deepening the integration of the needs of developing economies into the multilateral forum’s agenda, the Delhi declaration omitted words from the last year’s statement that overtly condemned Russian aggression against Ukraine — instead highlighting the human suffering and other negative impacts of the war in Ukraine that have complicated recovery efforts in the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The wording of “most members strongly condemned the war” was among the changes. Instead, G20 member states agreed to lean on the tenets of the United Nations charter on territorial integrity and against the use of force.
“Considerable time was spent — especially in the last few days — in regard to geopolitical issues, which really centered around the war in Ukraine,” Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankarsaid Saturday at a press conference following Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s initial announcement of the consensus on a joint declaration.
“Everybody helped, because everybody came together for the consensus, but the emerging markets took a particular lead on this and many of us have a strong history of working together,” Jaishankar added.
This accomplishment underscores India’s diplomatic clout at a time when global alliances are shifting. With the Russian and Chinese heads of state conspicuously absent from this year’s leaders’ summit, Modi has been keen to position India as a key global player advocating the interests of the Global South, while serving as an interlocutor with the developed nations.
Yet, there were some fears Delhi negotiators and diplomats might not have been able to broker a consensus at this year’s meeting. Fierce objections by the Russians and Chinese to references to the ongoing war in Ukraine have hobbled India’s efforts at fostering consensus in the major discussion tracks in the course of its year-long presidency.
Oleg Nikolenko, a spokesperson for the Ukraine’s foreign ministry, criticized the compromise in a Facebook post, saying the G20 joint communique was “nothing to be proud of.”
In the Delhi declaration, G20 leaders called for the “full, timely and effective implementation” of the Black Sea grain deal “to ensure the immediate and unimpeded deliveries of grain, foodstuffs, and fertilizers/inputs from the Russian Federation and Ukraine.”
Russia unilaterally withdrew from the deal — brokered between Turkey, the United Nations, Ukraine and Russia in July 2022 — that helped ease the Kremlin’s naval blockade in the Black Sea and established a humanitarian corridor for agricultural exports.
The ensuing food insecurity from the festering Ukraine crisis added to the many challenges that have afflicted the world in the last few years, complicating policy efforts to recover from the adverse economic and social impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Years of cascading challenges and crises have reversed gains in the 2030 Agenda and its Sustainable Development Goals,” G20 leaders said in the Delhi declaration, as they pledged to protect the most vulnerable in the world by promoting equitable growth and enhancing macroeconomic and financial stability.
To further cement that goal, India also fostered the admission of the African Union as the second regional grouping to gain full G20 membership after the European Union.
Other than the mitigation of the impact on geopolitics of food and energy security, the Delhi declaration also included the expediting of climate action, the provision of more loans to developing nations by multilateral institutions and restructuring the world’s debt architecture as well as an international framework for cryptocurrencies.
These pledges build on a G20 agreement to expand lending by multilateral institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Such steps could yield as much as $200 billion in extra funding in the next decade, Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said Saturday at the press conference explaining the Delhi declaration.
These four countries represent the current and the next three G20 member states that are due to hold the rotating presidency of the multilateral forum founded in 1999 to tackle the issues that afflict the global economy.
In the flurry of activities independent of the auspices of the main G20 summit, Modi and U.S President Joe Biden underscored not only the deepening partnership between their two countries, but also their urgency and resolve in persuading the world they represent a more viable strategic proposition in facilitating the developmental needs of the Global South.
Biden and Modi’s second bilateral meeting in less than six months on the eve of the two-day G20 leaders’ summit kicked off a series of other deals and announcements — a stark contrast, in particular, to Chinese President Xi Jinping’s decision to stay away from this summit.
Modi and Biden were joined by leaders from Argentina, Brazil, Italy, Mauritius, and the United Arab Emirates in launching the Global Biofuels Alliance, a partnership aimed at deploying greener fuels around the world that help meet decarbonization goals.
The two leaders also announced a plan to develop a network of railways and sea routes that will connect India, the European Union and Middle Eastern countries such as Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in “a transformative regional investment.”
This seeks to not only counter China’s influence in the energy-rich Middle East, but also its Belt and Road global infrastructure initiative.
Biden also announced a partnership with the European Union in a new greenfield rail line expansion to develop the Lobito Corridor connecting the southern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and northwestern Zambia to regional and global trade markets via the port of Lobito in Angola.
“This is a big deal, this is a real big deal,” Biden said Saturday. “The world stands at an inflection point in history, a point where decisions we make today affect the course of all our futures for decades to come.”
Indian artist Jagjot Singh Rubal gives final touches to an oil painting of U.S. President Joe Biden, at his workshop in Amritsar on September 5, 2023, ahead of the two-day G20 summit in New Delhi.
Narinder Nanu | Afp | Getty Images
NEW DELHI — Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and U.S. President Joe Biden pledged Friday to deepen the partnership between their countries in their second bilateral meeting in less than six months, as Delhi prepares to host a meeting among leaders of the Group of 20 leading industrialized and developing countries.
The two leaders met shortly at Modi’s official residence after Biden’s arrival in Delhi and then issued a 29-point statement that highlighted the depth and breadth of their relationship at a time of evolving global alliances — from building resilient strategic technology value chains and linking defense industrial ecosystems, to collaborating on renewable and nuclear energy, climate financing and cancer research.
The two leaders “reaffirmed the importance of the Quad in supporting a free, open, inclusive, and resilient Indo-Pacific” and “expressed their appreciation for the substantial progress underway to implement the ground breaking achievements of Prime Minister Modi’s historic June 2023 visit to Washington.” The Quad is an informal security alignment of Australia, India, Japan and the U.S., which came about in response to China’s rising strength in the Indo-Pacific region.
This closed-door meeting with Biden was the third — after meetings with leaders from Mauritius and Bangladesh — that Modi convened on the eve of the G20 leaders’ summit and part of the dozen or so bilateral meetings planned for this weekend, underscoring India’s strategic ambitions as a key global player connecting the developed world and the Global South.
The summit is an important one for Modi, whose government has turned the normally sedate rotating G20 presidency into a branding vehicle to burnish India’s geopolitical importance ahead of national elections next year. Many governments, investors and businesses are also starting to look toward India — as China slows — which the International Monetary Fund expects to be the fastest growing economy this year.
This weekend’s agenda includes the expected admission of the African Union as an official G20 member as part of India’s broad focus on elevating the place of the Global South and fostering inclusive and sustainable growth in the multilateral forum founded in 1999 as a platform to address issues afflicting the global economy.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and China President Xi Jinping though won’t be in attendance this weekend.
While Putin is sending Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to take his place, China Premier Li Qiang will take Xi’s place — the first time Xi is skipping the G20 meeting in the decade since he became president.
Putin has not traveled outside of Russia since the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for his arrest for war crimes in Ukraine.
The pair’s absence has sparked fears that a communique binding member states may not be issued at the end of a G20 leaders’ summit — undercutting India’s clout and diminishing his domestic messaging.
India’s diplomats have been unable to foster binding agreements in the key discussion tracks since it assumed the rotating presidency in December 2022 — because Russia and China have objected to the wording referring to the war in Ukraine.
A war of words has ensued ahead of this weekend’s meeting.
“The G7 countries (primarily the US, the UK, Germany, and France) have been exerting pressure on India in a bid to have their unilateral approaches to the Ukraine situation reflected in the final documents of G20 forums,” the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement.
At a pre-summit press conference Friday, India’s G20 sherpa Amitabh Kant said the final declaration “is almost ready.”
“I can assure you our presidency has been inclusive, decisive and action-oriented,” Kant said.
With Putin and Xi conspicuously absent this weekend, India and the U.S. will hope this will be sufficient to persuade member states and other observers from the Global South they represent a more viable proposition from food security to debt resolution.
In their joint statement after their Friday bilateral meeting, Biden and Modi “reaffirmed their commitment to the G20.”
They also “expressed confidence that the outcomes of the G20 Leaders’ Summit in New Delhi will advance the shared goals of accelerating sustainable development, bolstering multilateral cooperation, and building global consensus around inclusive economic policies to address our greatest common challenges, including fundamentally reshaping and scaling up multilateral development banks.”
While Putin has an obvious reason accounting for his absence, Xi, though, has not indicated a reason — triggering speculation the Chinese leader may be snubbing Modi for a variety of reasons.
Despite recently traveling to South Africa for a BRICS meeting, Xi has rarely traveled abroad. Instead, he has tended to receive visiting dignitaries in Beijing — including Zambia and Venezuela in overlapping visits this weekend.
India’s warming ties with the U.S. also sharply contrasts against its standoff with its neighbor, China.
India — along with Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam and Taiwan — sharply rebuked China last week for a new national map that Beijing claims contested territories as its own.
India also stands to gain from American companies looking to diversify their supply chains — at China’s expense — as the U.S. ramps up efforts to limit the transfers of strategic technology to China on the grounds of national security.
This would likely be what Modi and Biden conceived as “their ambitious vision for an enduring India-U.S. partnership that advances the aspirations of our people for a bright and prosperous future, serves the global good, and contributes to a free, open, inclusive, and resilient Indo-Pacific.”
Asia and the rest of the world face “immense” challenges, and the Asian Development Bank must work with others to address those issues, its director general told CNBC on Friday.
“The challenge that we are facing in this region and also globally, are immense, including climate change. pandemic and natural disasters,” Tomoyuki Kimura told CNBC’s Tanvir Gill on the sidelines of the G20 Summit held in the Indian capital of New Delhi.
After Covid, he explained, many countries had to borrow more money. “So this is a limitation for different countries to take more debt for their sustainable development and climate change.”
He said multilateral development banks “can and must take bold action to help address the challenges.”
The ADB “very much welcomes the efforts by all parties to ensure MDBs are well equipped to play this critical role,” he said, adding: “We also welcome India’s strong leadership advocacy for the importance of multilateralism.”
Additionally, the director general highlighted the need for ADB to increase its lending capacity in order to help countries achieve their climate goals, but emphasized that more needs to be done.
“First of all, we need to ramp up our lending capacity … but also, we need extra efforts to mobilize more money from private sector,” he said.
According to the World Bank, developing nations need more than $1 trillion per year to make significant headway in climate transition.
To aid in climate financing goals, Kimura called for the development of more pressing pipelines, de-risking projects, and reiterated the bank’s role in helping countries mobilize their domestic resources.
“We also need to play a very important role in overall debt issues,” Kimura said, highlighting that many countries have taken more debt following the pandemic.
In July, the United Nations reported that global public debt rose to a colossal record of $92 trillion in 2022.
“So this is a limitation for different countries to take more debt for their sustainable development and climate change,” Kimura said.
Kimura highlighted that the ADB is currently working on a capital adequacy framework, which if approved, could offer a “huge increase in lending capacity for the next decade and beyond.”
India’s relationship with the United States is the strongest it’s been in years.
U.S. President Joe Biden and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi are set to meet for another bilateral meeting later Friday at the Group of 20 summit in New Delhi, after several one-on-one meetings earlier this year.
Despite warming ties — with both leaders sharing a hug during Modi’s state visit to Washington in May — a “traditional alliance” between the two nations remains off the table, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.
“I do not think India and the United States are headed for a traditional alliance relationship … India is keen to make sure it protects its ability to make its own decisions on every kind of question,” said Alyssa Ayres, adjunct senior fellow for India, Pakistan, and South Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations.
US President Joe Biden and India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi during an event with senior officials and chief executive officers in the East Room of the White House in Washington on June 22, 2023.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
India is a “very independent” country, and the traditional alliance relationship the U.S. has with other countries “creates an almost unexpectable level of deference on the part of the other country,” Ayres told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia” on Friday.
“India very much doesn’t want … what it sees as its freedom of action in the future, constrained by requirements to act on behalf of another country due to an alliance agreement,” Ayres added.
Both countries still have disagreements, with a notable one being their views on the Russia-Ukraine war, which Washington has condemned but New Delhi has so far refrained from doing so.
India has purchased discounted Russian oil since the war broke out in February last year, and now imports about 40% of its crude supply from Moscow.
“Obviously, this is an area where American foreign policy leaders would like to see something different given American concerns about Russia’s war in Ukraine,” Ayres highlighted.
“So I think that this is yet another area where you do see some space between American interests and Indian interests … That’s probably going to remain an area of disagreement.”
Although an India-U.S. alliance seems to be off the table, the partnership between the two countries will continue to strengthen, with technology cooperation at the forefront of it.
In May, Biden and Modi announced a slew of technology and defense deals, ranging from collaborating on diversifying supply chains to working together across space and artificial intelligence.
“Technology generally has really been in the lead in improving this relationship,” said Evan Feigenbaum, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
“For a long time, people used to talk about India as a country that needed to be reformed. But increasingly, India has models and ideas and things that have been tested domestically that can be exported and scaled,” Feigenbaum told CNBC.
“They’re relevant in parts of the world, especially the global south like Africa and the Middle East, much more relevant than the models the United States and Europe has,” he added, citing the example of how India’s digital infrastructure has helped the “unbanked become banked.”
“It’s something the government wants to showcase and it’s something you’re going to hear a lot about at this G20,” Feigenbaum said.
The Maharajas of India’s past built magnificent palaces as a symbol of their power.
But in 1971, India abolished “privy purses,” or governmental payments made to these rulers. Several of themtransformed their vast estates into heritage hotels, or leased them to renowned hotel chains which carefully restored them to their former glory.
From the eastern state of Odisha to Rajasthan in the north, here are eight regal retreats where travelers can live like kings and queens.
Visitors can step back in time at Jehan Numa Palace in Bhopal, which has aneoclassical style and a 19th-century exterior.
Jehan Numa Palace.
Source: Jehan Numa Palace
This pristine white building was built by General Obaidullah Khan, son of the last ruling Begum of Bhopal, and transformed into a 100-room hotel by his grandsons in the 1980s. The hotel contains salvaged original artifacts and Raj-era photos as well as modern luxuries, such as a palm-lined pool and Chakra spa services.
Its palatial charm lingers among the racehorses that gallop around the track encircling the hotel. Travelers can dine on Italian and Mediterranean cuisine here, but Indophiles opt for the hotel’s legendary Bhopali fare prepared from secret palace recipes in a restaurant named Under the Mango Tree.
Once a nobleman’s home,the 19th-century Haveli Dharampura was meticulously restored over six years under the leadership of the prominent political figure Vijay Goel.
Haveli Dharampura.
Source: Heritage Dharampura
It’s now a 14-room boutique hotel, which received an honorable mention in 2017’s UNESCO Asia-Pacific Awards for Cultural Heritage Conservation. The atmospheric Mughal-era hotel has red sandstone-arched colonnades, a marble courtyard, Arabesque tile-work and intricate stone and wood details that echo the opulence of yesteryears.
The in-house Lakhori restaurant prepares historic Mughal recipes, while the breezy rooftop provides a delightful setting for drink-in-hand lounging while listening to the muezzin’s call from the nearby Jama Masjid — a soul-stirring reminder that you are in the heart of Old Delhi.
The hotel has guided heritage walks, kite-flying and high tea on the roof terrace, and kathak performances on Saturday and Sunday, where guests can enjoy an evening of Indian classical dance.
Accessible by boat, this stark white edifice in the heart of Lake Pichola (as seen in the 1983 James Bond flick “Octopussy”) was originally a summer pleasure palace for Mewar royalty in the 1740s.
It was transformed into a heritage hotel in the 1960s and is now impeccably managed by the Taj Group.
Taj Lake Palace
Source: Taj Lake Palace
Straight out of a fairy tale, the Taj Lake Palace boasts domed pavilions, ornamental turrets, crystal chandeliers, and 83 antique-filled rooms and suites, some which overlook a gleaming courtyard that hosts nightly folk dances.
It has four dining options serving globe-trotting menus, a spa boat and butler service.
Perched nearly 2,000 feet above sea level, this hilltop hotel has 60 rooms and suites, which increase in lavishness as you move up its room classes.
Taj Falaknuma Palace.
Source: Taj Falaknuma Palace
By the time you reach the Nizam Suite — graced with fine tapestry, a private pool and personal butler — it’s easy to envision the lifestyle of the Nizam of Hyderabad, who lived in the palace in the 19th century.
The rooms aren’t the only lure. The 130-year-old edifice is known for its state banquets of yore-style food, grand gardens, billiard room with monogrammed cues and ivory balls,anda library modeled on the one at Windsor Castle. Staterooms are decked out with Venetian chandeliers, royal portraits and heirlooms from the Nizams’ era.
This palace dating to the 1800s was, in its past life, a guesthouse and later royal residence of the ruling family of the state of Gwalior.
Taj Usha Kiran Palace.
Source: Taj Usha Kiran Palace
Today, it’s a lavish Taj hotel that balances old-world vibes with contemporary style. Its interiors contain ancient stone carvings, filigree work and rich tapestries. For a regal experience, travelers can take a heritage tour through the sprawling estate and stay in one of the Royal Suites, which are kitted out with four-poster beds, Venetian mirrors and mother-of-pearl mosaics.
The hotel also offers plenty of facilities to help guests unwind, including a spa, outdoor pool, and an Art Deco-style bar.
Set in 47 acres of gardens that arehome to peacocks, this former hunting lodge and royal abode of the Maharaja of Jaipur, dates back to 1835. It is now a heritage hotel managed by the Taj Group.
Rambagh Palace.
Source: Rambagh Palace
Exquisite antique furnishings, silk drapes, domed wooden ceilings and four-poster beds give the 78 rooms and suites a regal feel.
Many other features make Rambagh Palace an unforgettable retreat: heritage walks around the premises conducted by the palace butler, golf putting green, original palace dining room with chandeliers and gilded mirror, a Polo bar festooned with trophies and memorabilia of the Jaipur polo team, and a spa with Indian healing services.
The palace has hosted the likes ofKing Charles,Louis Mountbatten and Jacqueline Kennedy.
Nestled in the charming town of Baripada, The Belgadia Palace has been with the descendants of the same royal family since it was built in 1804, giving it an authenticity that is hard to replicate.
The Belgadia Palace.
Source: The Belgadia Palace
A portion of this historic palace has been converted into an 11-room hotel by Mrinalika and Akshita Bhanj Deo, royal descendants of the family. It boasts lofty ceilings, marble corridors and artifacts.
There’s also a lavish dining hall that serves Odisha-style meals, and elegant verandas on which to drink tea. The palace arranges activities such as traditional Chhau dance performances on the pristine lawns, handicraft village tours and other excursions.
The height of exclusivity, the Chittoor Kottaram — which once belonged to the king of Cochin — hosts only one group of no more than six people at any one time.
Chittoor Kottaram.
Source: Chittoor Kottaram
Nestled amid coconut groves by the edge of the lagoon backwaters of Kerala, the three-room abode boasts beautiful Athangudi floor tiles and wooden ceilings.
Precious artworks by Lady Hamlyn of The Helen Hamlyn Trust, the restorer of this 300-year-old palace, lend the property something of a museum feel. A personal chef prepares traditional Keralan dishes that can be eaten at a waterside gazebo or in the lush garden.
Ayurvedic massages and private cultural shows can be arranged, as can a private sunset cruise on the serene waterways.
NEW DELHI — The G20 endorsed language in support of Ukraine’s territorial integrity, but the group of the world’s biggest economies weakened a previous stance that directly blamed Russia for the war in Ukraine.
The joint communiqué for the G20 summit in India stated that all countries should “refrain from action against the territorial integrity and sovereignty or political independence of any state.” That language was unchanged from a draft first reported by POLITICO on Saturday.
The wording, which Western countries wanted in order to signal a continued anger at Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, could also appease Moscow’s complaints that attacks inside Russia have escalated since Kyiv launched its counteroffensive. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was deeply involved in the weeks of negotiations leading to the final version.
But the joint statement didn’t include a direct condemnation of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which a G20 statement in Bali last November did. Some officials contend that a shift was the only way to get buy-in from some of the group’s more Moscow-friendly members — let alone the fact that Russia is also in the bloc.
Critics argued that U.S. President Joe Biden could have gotten more. Svitlana Romanko, founder and director of the pro-Ukraine group Razom We Stand, called the communiqué “weak” and “cowardly by not even mentioning Russia or its ongoing war crimes.”
But some G20 members say it reflected a fair compromise. “It is a fact that this is today a very polarizing issue and there are multiple views on this,” Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said Saturday, referring to Ukraine. “Bali was a year ago, the situation was different. Many things have happened since then.”
There’s further language in the declaration that Western officials could herald as victories. It references adherence to the United Nations charter, which stipulates that no country can threaten another’s territory and sovereignty by force — a key demand of the U.S. and the EU in the run-up to the G20 summit. And it also calls for the “full, timely and effective implementation” of the Black Sea Grain Initiative which has stalled after Russia pulled out during the summer.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has already touted the document as a “good and strong outcome.”
“What you’ll see in the communique is strong language, highlighting the impact of the war on food prices and food security, calling on Russia to re-enter the Black Sea grain initiative to allow exports to leave that part of the world and help feed millions of the most vulnerable people as well as the communique recognizing the principles of the U.N. charter respecting territorial integrity,” he said.
People check Apple Macbook laptops at the new Apple Inc. store in New Delhi, India on April 20, 2023.
Nurphoto | Nurphoto | Getty Images
India’s consumer market is set to become the world’s third largest by 2027 as the number of middle to high-income households rise, according to a report by BMI.
The country currently ranks fifth, but the Fitch Solutions company predicts a 29% increase in real household spending will push India up two spots.
In fact, the report forecast that the growth in India’s household spending per capita will outpace that of other developing Asian economies like Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand at 7.8% year-on-year.
“Overall, the gap between total household spending across ASEAN and India will also almost triple,” the report said.
BMI estimates India’s household spending will exceed $3 trillion as disposable income rises by a compounded 14.6% annually until 2027. By then, a projected 25.8% of Indian households will reach $10,000 in annual disposable income.
“The majority of these households will be located in the economic centres, such as New Delhi, Mumbai and Bengaluru. The wealthier households are mainly located in urban areas, making it easy for retailers to target their key target markets,” BMI said.
India’s large youth population is also a driving force for increased consumer spending.
Approximately 33% of the country’s population is estimated to be between 20 and 33 years old, and BMI expects this group to spend big on electronics.
The report predicts communications spending will grow by an average of 11.1% annually to $76.2 billion by 2027 due to a “technology-literate, urban middle class with increasing amounts of disposable income that would encourage expenditure on aspirational products such as consumer electronics.”
The country’s ongoing urbanization will also help boost consumer spending as companies can more easily access consumers and open more physical retail stores to cater to them.
In April, Apple opened two retail stores in Delhi and Mumbai. Samsung announced in the same month that it will set up 15 premium experience stores across India by the end of the year in major cities like Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai.
BMI also noted that global investors such as Blackstone Group and APG Asset Management have injected more money into the country’s shopping mall business to capitalize on consumer spending growth.
Sam Altman, chief executive officer of OpenAI, at an event in Seoul, South Korea, on Friday, June 9, 2023.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Indonesia has awarded OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman its first “Golden Visa” — a week after the scheme was launched to attract foreign investment to Southeast Asia’s largest economy.
“There are several categories of golden visas apart from those based on investment/capital investment, one of which is the golden visa which is given to figures who have an international reputation and can provide benefits for Indonesia,” Silmy Karim, Indonesia’s director general of immigration, said in a statement.
“With this golden visa, the hope is that Altman can contribute towards the development and use of AI in Indonesia,” Karim said.
Altman’s “Golden Visa” is for 10 years. As a golden visa holder, the American entrepreneur will get to enjoy priority screening at airports across the country’s vast archipelago, along with longer periods of stay and ease of entry and exit.
Altman, who co-founded ChatGPT maker OpenAI with Elon Musk, was in Indonesia earlier his year as part of a whirlwind tour that took him to several major cities in Asia, including Beijing, Tokyo, Seoul and Singapore.
ChatGPT is the AI chatbot that has gone viral for its ability to generate humanlike responses to users’ prompts. Just two months after its launch, it hit 100 million users.
US President Joe Biden, right, and Narendra Modi, India’s prime minister, at an arrival ceremony during a state visit on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, June 22, 2023.
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Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has turned the normally sedate rotating presidency of the Group of 20 nations into a branding vehicle to burnish India’s geopolitical importance — underscoring India’s emergence as a key voice on the world stage.
The country’s diplomats now face a race against time to broker tangible multilateral outcomes at this weekend’s G20 leaders’ summit in New Delhi that will mark the end of India’s year-long presidency of the bloc of leading industrialized and developing economies.
India has so far not been able to foster consensus for a joint communique from the previous G20 meetings in other major tracks that it has convened. Member states haven’t been able to agree on binding action due largely to Russia’s and China’s objections to the language referring to the Ukraine crisis.
In a banner year for Indian diplomacy that also saw the world’s most populous nation take on the rotating presidency of Shanghai Cooperation Organization, India risks having little to show for its efforts that may in turn undercut the country’s credibility and Modi’s domestic messaging.
One of the risks is that by elevating India’s presidency of the G20 so much, there are now expectations for India to deliver some concrete breakthroughs.
Manjari Chatterjee Miller
Council on Foreign Relations
“What is different about India’s presidency of the G20 and what I’m amazed by is how the Modi government has turned the G20 into a nonstop advertisement for both India and his leadership,” said Manjari Chatterjee Miller, a senior fellow for India, Pakistan and South Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, D.C.
“One of the risks is that by elevating India’s presidency of the G20 so much, there are now expectations for India to deliver some concrete breakthroughs,” she told CNBC in an email. “India has been trying to use the G20 to bring the Global South together and offer itself as a bridge between the Global South and the West. But there remains the problem of Russia and China.”
With Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping sitting out the Sept. 9-10 meeting, the prospect for any real breakthrough appears dim.
Indeed, the specter of Russia’s Ukraine invasion has loomed large over G20 meetings for the various tracks that India has convened.
India had hoped to forge consensus on a range of issues from a regulatory framework for cryptocurrencies to the resolution of crippling debt issues for developing countries.
Other areas include reforms in multilateral banks as part of its agenda to foster progress on sustainable development, as well as the admission of the African Union as a member of the G20.
Despite its neutral position on the Ukraine crisis, New Delhi has not been able to broker a single joint statement in any of the key discussion tracks since India took over the G20 presidency in December 2022. Instead, it has only managed non-binding chair’s summary and outcome documents.
In fact, Russia disassociated itself from the status of the outcome document in a June meeting on development issues in Varanasi, due to references to the Ukraine war. China said the meeting outcome should not include any reference to the Ukraine crisis.
“The original language was accepted by Russia at the Bali G20 — and Indian diplomats in fact, played a major part in getting Russian acceptance on that,” Pramit Pal Chaudhuri, Eurasia Group’s head for its South Asia practice, told CNBC in a telephone interview from New Delhi.
“But since then, Russia has hardened its position and joined by China to say that we don’t accept the original body language, which is taken from the UN Security Council resolution,” he added.
“Last I heard, India is still struggling to get an agreement on what type of language would be acceptable to all 20 countries,” Chaudhuri said. “If they fail to bridge that gap, then we may see the failure to issue a joint statement, and there probably won’t be an action plan afterwards.”
[Modi] is trying to portray this as a great recognition that India has arrived under his under his prime ministership.
Pramit Pal Chaudhuri
Eurasia Group
Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov — who is due to represent Russia at G20 leaders’ summit in place of Putin — reportedly warned there will be no general declaration at the meeting in New Delhi if Russia’s position is not reflected.
The Kremlin insists that its invasion of Ukraine is a “special military operation” in an existential war against the West that’s determined to take down Russia.
This could well be a setback for Modi’s government, which has convened more than 200 G20 meetings in more than two dozens cities across India.
“It’s actually quite brilliant and one has to give him and the BJP credit for making an event that is usually elitist and esoteric, and a rotating presidency that is routine into something the whole country can understand and be proud of,” CFR’s Miller said, referring to Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
More than just lining streets with banners and signs that injected plenty of visibility to the various G20 meetings, Modi has also used these meetings to clean up host cities, promote local products and more.
“At the national level, [Modi] is trying to portray this as a great recognition that India has arrived under his under his prime ministership,” Eurasia Group’s Chaudhuri said. “I think the messaging has been strong, but the reception is harder to work out, it’s harder to quantify.”
The biggest risk for Modi is the lack of tangible multilateral accomplishment out of the G20 presidency after all that has been done and invested, possibly with an eye on boosting the legacy and standing of his Hindu nationalist BJP after a decade in power and ahead of national elections next year.
Underscoring that wariness, India’s Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar was quick to tout the “unanimous support” from G20 member states, for twooutcomes that India proposed at the Varanasi G20 ministerial meeting on developmental issues. He even labeled it the “biggest achievement” of India’s G20 presidency so far — despite Russia and China abstaining.
“There may be a sort of backlash, or a degree of cynicism may set among voters who say — we have heard a lot — we seem to have spent a lot of money, but nothing really seems to have happened here,” Chaudhuri added.
India walked the diplomatic tightrope even as China pushed for an expansion of BRICS alliance of developing nations to build support for a broad coalition aimed at challenging U.S. dominance over the global political and economic system.
“India will continue to maintain healthy diplomatic relations with Russia amid an increasing reliance on that country’s energy imports,” Sumedha Dasgupta, a senior analyst with the Economist Intelligence Unit, told CNBC. Moscow is India’s leading source of crude oil.
“Simultaneously, India will develop stronger diplomatic bonds with the US and its allies through means such as the Quad, co-operation on critical technology and defense, which will over time amount to a gradual geopolitical shift,” she said in an email.
Underscoring India’s strategic importance, Biden hosted Modi in June in the Indian prime minister’s first state visit to the U.S.
Warming India-U.S. ties contrast with India’s continued standoff with China.
India — along with Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam and Taiwan — sharply rebuked China last week for a new national map that Beijing claims contested territories as its own.
As the U.S. ramps up efforts to limit the transfers of strategic technology to China on grounds of national security, India stands to gain from American companies looking to diversify their supply chains — at China’s expense.
In January, India’s commerce minister told CNBC that Apple was manufacturing its latest iPhone 14 in the country and aimed to produce 25% of all iPhones in the country.
This development serves to buttress India’s burgeoning economic clout, the basis of its greater confidence and assertiveness geopolitically.
It’s a happy coincidence for the moment, I think, for India to showcase itself as an improved economy; as an improved place for international investors … and as an alternative to China.
Pravin Krishna
Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies
In the last decade in power, Modi’s BJP has liberalized foreign direct investment policies, invested in infrastructure, pushed for digitalization in the world’s fifth-largest economy, along with several other neo-liberal economic policies.
“All of of these things are coming together at the right time, alongside the G20,” said Pravin Krishna, a professor of international economics at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies.
“So it’s a happy coincidence for the moment, I think, for India to showcase itself as an improved economy; as an improved place for international investors; as an improved platform, potentially for manufacturing; and as an alternative to China, which India has been aspiring to be for a number of years,” he added.
Sultan Al Jaber, chief executive of the UAE’s Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) and president of this year’s COP28 climate summit gestures during an interview as part of the 7th Ministerial on Climate Action (MoCA) in Brussels on July 13, 2023.
Francois Walschaerts | Afp | Getty Images
UAE oil giant ADNOC — run by the president of the COP28 climate conference — is expected to spend more than $1 billion every month this decade on fossil fuels, according to new analysis.
This is nearly seven times higher than its commitment to decarbonization projects over the same timeframe, the research says.
It comes ahead of the COP28 climate summit, with Dubai set to host the U.N.’s annual conference from Nov. 30 through to Dec. 12. Viewed as one of the most significant climate conferences since 2015’s landmark Paris Agreement, COP28 will see global leaders gather to discuss how to progress in the fight against the climate crisis.
The person overseeing the talks, Sultan al-Jaber, is chief executive of ADNOC (the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company) — one of the world’s largest oil and gas firms. His position as both COP28 president and ADNOC CEO caused dismay among civil society groups and U.S. and EU lawmakers, although several government ministers have since defended his appointment.
Analysis conducted by international NGO Global Witness, and provided exclusively to CNBC, found that ADNOC is planning to spend an average of $1.14 billion a month on oil and gas production alone between now and 2030 — the same year in which the U.N. says the world must cut emissions by 45% to avoid global catastrophe.
It means that ADNOC is forecast to spend nearly seven times more on fossil fuels through to 2030 than it does on “low-carbon solution” projects.
By 2050, the year in which the U.N. says the entire world economy must achieve net-zero emissions, ADNOC is projected to have invested $387 billion in oil and gas. The burning of fossil fuels is the chief driver of the climate emergency.
ADNOC, which recently became the first among its peers to bring forward its net-zero ambition to 2045, disputes Global Witness’ analysis and says the assumptions made are inaccurate.
“The analysis of, and assumptions made, regarding ADNOC’s capital expenditure program beyond the company’s current five-year business plan (2023 to 2027) are speculative and therefore incorrect,” a spokesperson at ADNOC told CNBC via email.
The Abu Dhabi energy group announced in January this year that it would allocate $15 billion for investment in “low-carbon solutions” by 2030, including investments in clean power, carbon capture and storage and electrification projects.
High-rise tower buildings along the central Sheikh Zayed Road in Dubai on July 3, 2023.
Karim Sahib | Afp | Getty Images
Global Witness arrived at its projections by analyzing ADNOC’s forecasted oil and gas capital expenditure, exploratory capital expenditure and operational expenditure for the period from 2023 to 2050. The data was sourced from Rystad Energy’s UCube database.
Rystad’s data is not available to the public, but is widely used and referenced by major oil and gas companies and international bodies.
“Fossil fuels companies like to burnish their green credentials, yet they rarely say the quiet part out loud: that they continue to throw eyewatering amounts at the same old polluting oil and gas that is accelerating the climate crisis,” said Patrick Galey, senior investigator at Global Witness.
“How [al-Jaber] can expect to lecture other nations on the need to decarbonise and be taken seriously is anyone’s guess, while he continues to provide vastly more funding to oil and gas than to renewable alternatives,” he added.
“He is a fossil fuel boss, plain and simple, saying one thing while his company does the other,” Galey said.
The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the analysis conducted by Global Witness. The Conference of the Parties (COP) is the supreme decision-making body of the UNFCCC.
Al-Jaber was the founding CEO of Abu Dhabi state-owned renewable energy firm Masdar, which works in more than 40 countries worldwide and has invested in or committed to invest in renewable energy projects with a total value of over $30 billion.
Speaking earlier this year, al-Jaber said the main priority for the COP28 summit will be to keep alive the fight to limit global heating to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
The Paris Agreement aims to limit the increase in the global average temperature to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit global heating to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Beyond the critical temperature threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius, it becomes more likely that small changes can trigger dramatic shifts in Earth’s entire life support system.
The International Energy Agency says no new oil, gas or coal development is compatible with the goal of curbing global heating to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
In response to a request for comment from CNBC, an ADNOC spokesperson said that energy demand is increasing as the world’s population is expanding. “All of the current energy transition scenarios, including by the IEA, show that some level of oil and gas will be needed into the future,” the spokesperson said.
“As such, it is important that, in addition to accelerating investments in renewables and lower carbon energy solutions, we consider the least carbon intensive sources of oil and gas and further reduce their intensity to enable a fair, equitable, orderly, and responsible energy transition. This is the approach ADNOC is taking,” they added.
The spokesperson said its 2022 upstream emissions data confirmed the energy group as one of the least carbon-intensive producers worldwide. The company will seek to further reduce its carbon intensity by 25% and target near zero methane emissions by 2030, they added.
“As we reduce our emissions, we are also ramping up investments in renewables and zero carbon energies like hydrogen for our customers,” the spokesperson said.
A separate report published in April last year by Global Witness and Oil Change International found that 20 of the world’s biggest oil and gas companies were projected to spend $932 billion by the end of the decade to develop new oil and gas fields.
At that time, Russian state company Gazprom was estimated to spend the most on fossil fuel development and exploration projects through to 2030 ($139 billion), followed by U.S. oil majors ExxonMobil ($84 billion) and Chevron ($67 billion).
U.S. President Joe Biden having a virtual meeting with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping from the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, DC, on November 15, 2021.
Mandel Ngan | Afp | Getty Images
BEIJING — China’s Ministry of Commerce said Thursday that restoring stability in U.S.-China trade relations is the best way to “de-risk” — a twist to a term that’s become popular in international politics.
The word has been used by U.S. and EU officials as an attempt to position their countries as not completely separating from China in a decoupling scenario, but diversifying in areas where over-reliance on China poses a risk.
“We believe the best way to ‘de-risk’ is to return to the consensus agreed to by the two heads of state at Bali, return China-U.S. trade relations to a healthy, stable development path,” Shu Jueting, spokesperson at the Ministry of Commerce, said at a press conference in Mandarin, translated by CNBC.
That also “allows bilateral economic trade relations to better play the role of ‘ballast,’ stabilizing business expectations and increasing business confidence for carrying out trade and investment.”
In November last year, U.S. President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping met in Bali, Indonesia, for their first in-person meeting since Biden took office. Their meeting kicked off formal plans for U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other U.S. senior officials to visit China this year.
As long as the two countries are not in open military conflict, I expect the U.S. and China will continue to have substantial trade and investment ties…
Scott Kennedy
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Shu pointed out that in the first seven months of this year, U.S. direct investment in China rose by 25.5% from a year ago. The Ministry of Commerce is working with local authorities to implement recently released plans for improving the environment for foreign investment, she said.
“Although there has been pullback from both sides on certain elements of the commercial relationship, declarations of a full or even partial decoupling are so far inaccurate and highly premature,” said Scott Kennedy, senior advisor and trustee chair in Chinese business and economics at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.
“As long as the two countries are not in open military conflict, I expect the U.S. and China will continue to have substantial trade and investment ties even while also treating each other as geostrategic competitors,” he said. “Such interactions are not only commercially beneficial, there is also a persuasive national security logic to maintaining ties.”
Some have argued that being involved with another economic power gives the U.S. insight into its activities — and a potential point of leverage.
When Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao and U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo met this week, the Chinese side emphasized that “generalization of national security isn’t beneficial for normal economic trade exchanges,” spokesperson Shu said.
“It will only damage the stability and safety of global supply chains, hurt businesses’ expectations for developing economic and trade collaboration and destroy the atmosphere for cooperation,” Shu said.
“My message was there’s a desire to do business, but we need predictability, due process and a level playing field,” Raimondo said in an exclusive interview with CNBC’s Eunice Yoon on Wednesday.
In comments to reporters, Raimondo added the U.S. doesn’t want to decouple from China. She said Biden’s message was: “We are derisking, we’re investing in America, but we are not decoupling or trying to hold down China’s economy.”
“The relationship remains fundamentally competitive and, on some fronts, borderline adversarial,” Eurasia Group analysts said in a note. “However, the Biden administration is striving to keep adversity in check with a careful push-pull strategy of targeted escalation and moderated concessions.”
The note pointed out the campaign cycle ahead of the U.S. presidential election next fall “will also inject volatility in the coming months.”
An aerial view shows the Central Bank of India building, in Mumbai, India, 28 September, 2022. (Photo by Niharika Kulkarni/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
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The global economy is set to slow down as inflation remains stickier than expected — but there may be some “pockets of resilience,” according to Moody’s Investors Service.
“We’re expecting globally a slowdown in growth, and that will have an impact on [emerging markets] Asia through trade conditions as well as access to financing in the region,” Marie Diron, managing director for global sovereign and sub-sovereign risk at Moody’s Investors Service, told CNBC Thursday.
Diron said the slowdown can be attributed to three factors: higher interest rates that persist, China’s slowing growth, as well as financial system stresses.
While central banks have managed to steer the global economy and “create a disinflationary trend” by raising interest rates, inflation risks are still a sticking point, she said.
“There are still risks out there that inflation could prove stickier … than currently expected, and that would lead to higher risks for longer and slower growth,” explained the managing director.
In the last year and a half, the U.S. central bank has raised the benchmark fed funds rate to between 5.25% to 5.5%. Fed Chair Jerome Powell last Friday warned that additional interest rate increases could be on the table.
A second risk is financial system stress, Diron said.
“We’ve seen banks absorbing that period of higher rates, which has had some positive impacts on margins for some, but also needed an adjustment in businesses, an adjustment to continue to attract deposits,” she explained.
“It could be that there are pockets of stress that currently have not quite emerged that materialize maybe later this year on to next year.”
Finally, China is a third source of vulnerability.
Moody’s is not expecting a quick turnaround in the world’s second largest economy and sees “relatively slow growth in China with implications across the region,” Diron said.
“It is an outlook really clouded by downside risks. And that may have an implication for default rates.”
While Moody’s expects a coming slowdown, there may be some “pockets of resilience,” Diron said.
She acknowledged that “we do see a slowdown from this year onto next year,” but added: “We see relatively robust growth and favorable conditions in markets like India and Indonesia.”
Indonesia in particular has the potential to materialize the country’s “vast natural resources” and develop the downstream sectors, through processing of minerals through the value chain, Diron noted.
The Southeast Asian nation carries large natural deposits including tin, nickel, cobalt and bauxite — some of which are important raw materials for electric vehicle production.
China’s factory activity in August shrank for a fifth straight month, while non-manufacturing activity hit a new low for the year — signs that the slowdown in the world’s second-largest economy may not yet have bottomed out.
The official manufacturing purchasing managers’ index rose slightly to 49.7 in August from 49.3 in July, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics released Thursday. This was better than the median forecast for 49.4 in a Reuters poll.
A PMI reading above 50 indicates expansion in activity, while a reading below that level points to a contraction.
“The survey results show that insufficient market demand is still the main problem that enterprises are facing, and the foundation for the recovery and development of the manufacturing industry needs to be further consolidated,” Zhao Qinghe, a senior NBS official, said in a statement.
While there were some green shoots in the sub-indexes for China’s manufacturing PMI — with four of five registering expansion — the non-manufacturing PMI, which covers the service sectors, fell to 51.0 in August. That compares with 51.5 in July and 53.2 in June.
There are growing concerns that the Chinese economy may not meet Beijing’s stated 5% growth target this year, amid a festering crisis of confidence in the country’s property sector that’s plagued by credit woes and weak sales.
Beijing has resorted to a rather targeted approach in bolstering the economy, ranging from measures to boost lending and stocks investment, to more tangible measures aimed at boosting housing demand.
Underscoring the uneven recovery in the Chinese economy, Thursday’s data release showed manufacturing-related sub indexes for production and new orders hitting five-month highs, while the new orders sub-index for China’s non-manufacturing sectors fell to 47.6.
The new order index for the construction industry was 48.5, an increase from July when construction starts were hampered by extreme weather. The new order index of the service industry was 47.4 — a decrease of 1.0 percentage points from the previous month.
Input prices for both manufacturing and non-manufacturing sectors increased in August, translating to higher output prices — which suggests inflationary pressures may be rebounding. Recent data had pointed to disinflation or deflationary trends.
An undated aerial view of Singapore’s Marina Bay at night.
Nikada | E+ | Getty Images
SINGAPORE – As Singaporeans prepare to head to the polls this Friday to elect their ninth president, the campaigning has so far tested the narrow confines of the presidential office — underscoring simmering disenchantment at the status quo.
A largely ceremonial role with a six-year tenure, the Singapore presidency is conferred limited powers. One of its key roles is to guard the wealthy Southeast Asian city-state’s reserves, which remain a state secret.
Observers say some Singaporeans seem to believe the president’s custodial powers over the reserves allows the person to weigh more muscularly on fiscal and monetary policy decisions.
Other issues underscored on the campaign trail so far include underlying unhappiness about the high cost of living, unaffordable public housing and debate about heightened competition for jobs with foreigners. A lack of accountability among lawmakers also came to the fore as Singapore’s reputation for incorruptibility was recently hit by a spate of political scandals.
“The contest that has developed so far reflects the competing and even conflicting visions of the presidency,” said Eugene Tan, an associate professor of law at the Singapore Management University who is a former parliamentarian.
“It has taken on a partisan bent especially for Tan Kin Lian who has staked for himself as the standard bearer for anti-establishment sentiments.”
Tan Kin Lian, the former chief executive of local insurer NTUC Income, is again running for president more than a decade after garnering the lowest number of votes of four candidates at the 2011 presidential election.
Two of his rivals from his first presidential bid are now leaders of opposition parties, and have declared their support for the 75-year-old after he came under fire for offensive social media posts.
Presidential candidate Tan Kin Lian (left) waves as he arrives at the nomination center for the presidential election in Singapore on August 22, 2023.
Roslan Rahman | Afp | Getty Images
Tan is joined on the ballot by Ng Kok Song, 75, the former chief investment officer of Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund — who famously introduced the late Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore’s founding prime minister, to the benefits of meditation.
Much of the discourse on the campaign trail that started Aug. 22 centered around the candidates’ real capacity for independent and non-partisan decision-making.
The support of two of his former rivals though have undercut Tan’s claims of political independence in a bid to distinguish himself — though he was once an active volunteer with a local chapter of the ruling People’s Action Party.
“There appears to be a growing trend of Singaporeans wanting a more outspoken President that will publicly question the government’s stances and policies from a position of neutrality and authority,” Nydia Ngiow, managing director at BowerGroupAsia, told CNBC in an email.
Ng Kok Song, a former GIC chief investment officer, pictured in Singapore July 13, 2023. Song is standing in the city-state’s 2023 presidential election.
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“While this suggests that the desire for the President to force the government to provide more accountability is rooted in the belief that such a counterbalance of power would be good for society as a whole, there is also concern that this further contributes to the ‘us against them’ mentality which politicizes the role and adds a partisan element more typically tied to general elections,” she added.
Ng and Shanmugaratnam have touted their experience and expertise in qualifying them to expertly guard the country’s past reserves, in consultation with a council of advisors.
“Everyone knows from my background … that I understand the system very well,” Shanmugaratnam told reporters Aug. 26. “I will work with respect with the [Council of Presidential Advisors]. But, as you know, no one in the bureaucracy or anywhere else can fool me on any matter to do with government finances.”
Presidential candidate Tharman Shanmugaratnam waves to his supporters at the nomination center for the upcoming presidential election in Singapore on Aug. 22, 2023. Singapore will hold polls for the presidential election on Sept. 1, Returning Officer Tan Meng Dui announced on Tuesday after three candidates filed nomination documents.
The full scale of Singapore’s reserves is not publicly available, though public information of some institutions charged with investing its reserves offer a glimpse into its real size.
The Monetary Authority of Singapore transferred in the 2022/23 financial year a total of S$191 billion to sovereign wealth fund GIC for management, and has S$441 billion of official reserves under its management end-May even after this transfer.
Singapore’s presidency has been directly elected only since 1993, after the late Lee Kuan Yew proposed a constitutional amendment to guard against unfettered access to the government’s reserves if a “freak election result” ousted the longstanding People’s Action Party from power.
Still, this election would only mark the third time the presidency is contested.
This is largely due to stringent eligibility rules that require, among other criteria, candidates to have served at least three years as a government minister, senior public servant or chief executive of a government statutory board.
Candidates from the private sector would need to have served as the most senior executive of a company with an average of S$500 million in shareholders’ equity and the firm must have been profitable for the three preceding years.
Local independent news outlet Jom estimated that only 0.044% of Singaporean adults qualify to run as Singapore president.
Whoever wins, Singapore’s Presidential Election is destined to disappoint
Kevin Tan and Cherian George
National University of Singapore and Hong Kong Baptist University
The incumbent Halimah Yacob — a practicing Muslim and a former Speaker of Parliament — became Singapore’s first female president without a contest in 2017.
The presidential office was reserved for members of the Malay community that year to ensure representation from among Singapore’s official four main races — if that community had not been represented for five presidential terms.
“Whoever wins, Singapore’s Presidential Election is destined to disappoint,” Kevin Tan, an academic affiliated with the National University of Singapore and Cherian George, a professor at Hong Kong Baptist University’s School of Communication, said in a recent commentary.
“This has little to do with the quality of the men who want to run, and everything to do with the lack of consensus about the rules of the race and the nature of the prize,” they added. “Many Singaporeans are unhappy that the field is so tightly managed by the establishment, undermining the Presidency’s potential as an independent check on Government.”
If Shanmugaratnam wins Friday’s vote, he would represent a fifth-straight candidate seen as the establishment choice who’s been directly elected president.
This frustration is manifest in a social media campaign urging Singaporeans to spoil their votes at this presidential election.
“The appeal of vote-spoiling is two-fold: firstly, that voters may feel that no candidate appropriately represents their political interest and secondly, that voters may feel that the entirety of the electoral process is undemocratic and are spoiling their votes in protest,” said BowerGroupAsia’s Ngiow.
At the last contested presidential election in 2011, the establishment candidate Tony Tan only won by a 0.35% margin in a four-man race. Invalid votes accounted for 1.76% of all votes cast.
“The social media campaign indicates that Singaporean voters are increasingly beginning to tap into more nuanced forms of voter expression, signaling the electorate’s growing maturity as well as frustration that parties should heed ahead of the next general election,” she said.
SINGAPORE — Southeast Asia’s fourth largest bank OCBC suffered a short outage on Monday that affected its digital and card banking channels.
At 9.43 a.m. Singapore time, the bank said in a Facebook post that it was facing “technical problems impacting our banking channels.”
About an hour later at 10.37 a.m., OCBC announced that card and branch services were restored, followed by ATM services.
Shares of the Singapore-headquartered lender gained 1.05% in afternoon trade.
In a statement to CNBC, OCBC sought to assure customers there was no security breach.
“We want to assure them that their monies remained safe and customer data was secured throughout. We are investigating the cause of the technical problem and will provide an update as soon as we can,” an OCBC spokesperson said.
