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Sunil Garg of Lighthouse Canton shares his outlook for e-commerce company PDD and compares China's banks sector to that of India and Korea's.
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Tag: PDD Holdings Inc
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After doubts about Alibaba’s future, co-founder Joe Tsai says: ‘We’re back’
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Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba is back on track to be a top market player after a period of pressure, co-founder Joe Tsai told CNBC’s Emily Tan in an exclusive interview Friday.
Questions about Alibaba’s future have mounted after a series of internal changes, a scrapped cloud computing IPO and competition for its core e-commerce business.
The long-time behemoth in China’s online shopping world has in recent years faced greater competition as cost-conscious consumers turn to lower-priced goods from PDD Holdings, and amid the rise of livestreaming sales on Douyin, China’s version of TikTok that’s owned by ByteDance.
“Now with the restructuring and with the new management in place, we feel a lot more confident in placing as one of the top e-commerce players in China,” Tsai said. “Where we didn’t feel as confident as before, we felt the competitive pressure, but now we’re back.”
He also expects the penetration of e-commerce in China to exceed 40% in the next five years, up significantly from the current 30% level.
Tsai has been part of Alibaba since its founding in 1999. He became chairman of Alibaba in September as part of a leadership reshuffle.
Eddie Wu became CEO of the company at the same time, replacing Daniel Zhang, who had also held the chairman role. In December, Wu took over as head of the Taobao and Tmall e-commerce business from Trudy Dai.
The management shakeup followed an overhaul of Alibaba’s business last year that split the company into six business groups, with an eye to list them publicly starting with the cloud unit.
However, Alibaba in November pulled plans for a cloud IPO, citing U.S. chip export curbs. Zhang was originally supposed to stay on as head of the cloud business but abruptly quit the company in September.
Tsai said a cloud IPO would have made more sense if investor sentiment was higher.
“Markets haven’t been great,” he said. As for an IPO of Alibaba’s Cainiao logistics business, he said the company was waiting for better timing.
Cainiao filed for a public offering on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in September, but has yet to list.
In the last several months, Tsai and fellow co-founder Jack Ma have bought more than $200 million worth of Alibaba shares between them.
Alibaba
Alibaba’s U.S.-traded shares have barely changed for the year so far, trading at around $76 â a fraction of its stock price of about $300 in November 2020.
That same month, the company’s fintech affiliate Ant Group’s IPO was abruptly suspended by Chinese authorities. Beijing later fined Alibaba for alleged monopolistic behavior.
Since then, the company has faced increased competition amid slower growth in China’s economy. PDD Holdings, which owns Pinduoduo and Temu, temporarily saw its market capitalization surge past Alibaba’s.
When asked about the success of China-affiliated e-commerce players like Temu, Shein and TikTok in the U.S., Tsai said the companies offered “a great consumer proposition” due to “high quality” products and “reasonable prices.”
“They’re very aggressive doing it and we’re going to observe and figure out what we want to do,” he said, noting Alibaba already sells overseas through AliExpress and Trendyol, which focuses on Turkey.
As for U.S.-China tensions, Tsai said the two governments have realized they need to work together in certain areas despite fierce competition, something Alibaba would have to learn how to deal with.
Although Alibaba no longer plans to spin off its cloud business, the company remains intent on building up its artificial intelligence capabilities and making money from cloud computing.
E-commerce, Tsai said, offers “one of the richest use-case scenarios, or brings the most variety, in terms of use cases for using AI applications.” They include the ability to quickly create product catalogs for consumers, as well as virtual dressing rooms for clothes, he added.
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Alibaba was once a Wall Street darling. After plunging 75% over three years, what's next?
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Signage for Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. covers the front facade of the New York Stock Exchange November 11, 2015.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters
BEIJING — It’s been a tumultuous 12 months for Alibaba, casting doubt on the future of the tech giant just as artificial intelligence is taking off.
The company’s cloud computing unit was poised to capture AI’s growth for investors in a public listing, until Alibaba pulled those plans in November. The Group’s U.S. market value fell below that of e-commerce rival PDD, signaling struggles in the industry that had propelled Alibaba onto the global stage with the world’s largest IPO in 2014.
On the political front, Alibaba was a poster child for China’s crackdown on internet tech companies — receiving a record fine of $2.8 billion for alleged monopolistic behavior in 2021. Slowing economic growth hasn’t helped its business either.
But the scrapped cloud IPO plans and management shakeup in the last year reflect bigger problems for a company that has served as a bellwether for foreign investors in China. Alibaba’s stock has plunged to below $77 a share, down by 75% from more than $300 in 2020.
“I think there are some deep internal issues. And so there must now be … a clear internal fight between how they’re going to get out of this because they’re really slipping,” said Duncan Clark, an early advisor to Alibaba and now chairman of Beijing-based investment advisor BDA.
“The core to me is their eroding market position, what they are doing in terms of video, livestream and how they respond to Douyin, plus how they manage all these disparate groups and all the management turmoil,” Clark said. ”It’s a mess basically.”
Douyin, the domestic Chinese version of ByteDance’s TikTok, has taken off in China as a platform for the surging livestream sales industry. Chinese consumers, who are increasingly hunting for bargains, have also turned to bargain hunting on Pinduoduo.
Founded in 1999 by Jack Ma, Alibaba is a far older company than ByteDance or PDD.
“Personnel-wise there are people that are leaving the company, they may feel the company is so big and bureaucratic, that is a reality,” said Brian Wong, former Alibaba Group vice president and author of the “Tao of Alibaba,” published in November 2022.
Management shake-up centered on cloud
Are they too big? That was the charge from the government before, but now the question is are they nimble enough, are they able to compete enough in the marketplace?
Duncan Clark
BDA, chairman
“Are they too big? That was the charge from the government before, but now the question is are they nimble enough, are they able to compete enough in the marketplace?” he said. Clark also wrote “Alibaba: The House That Jack Ma Built,” published in 2016.
Cloud competition from Huawei
Alibaba has been an industry leader in the cloud business.
The company remained the largest player in China’s cloud market in the third quarter, followed by Huawei and Tencent, according to Canalys.
But the research firm predicted that Huawei’s market share will gradually increase, said analyst Yi Zhang.
She pointed out the telecommunications company started in 2022 to focus on improving its engagement with business partners — via a strategy of developing an ecosystem of experts and developers. In contrast, she said Alibaba’s and Tencent’s cloud units only started pursuing a similar strategy in 2023.
Such an approach can pay off in a slowing cloud services market that Canalys said is “relying heavily on government and state-owned enterprises to drive growth.”
Chinese business news site 36kr reported in January last year, citing sources, that government customers closed cloud deals with Huawei, after almost buying from Alibaba.
Alibaba and Huawei did not respond to a request for comment on this story. Alibaba in November blamed U.S. restrictions on chip sales to China for the decision to pull the cloud IPO.
Alibaba said its cloud business revenue grew by just 2% year-on-year in the quarter ended Sept. 30. Since the quarter ended June, the company has included cloud revenue from business with other parts of Alibaba Group.
BDA’s Clark said his firm’s research found that Alibaba tried to grow its cloud business by taking away big clients from third-party resellers. Those resellers were other companies that had acted as distributors or agents for Alibaba cloud and received commissions.
“It may be like a botched go-to-market strategy, or reseller strategy, because a lot of those resellers … became very upset and some of them are now going to work with other players,” Clark said. “They were supposed to be able to focus on smaller companies rather than the big ones that were taken away but that didn’t materialize. It’s a very tough market.“
Global IPO market slump
Alibaba still plans to list its Cainiao logistics business, and its Freshippo grocery store chain. But it’s been a tough IPO market, especially for Chinese companies wanting to list overseas.
The Information reported in November, citing sources, that an international investment firm was only willing to value Alibaba’s cloud unit at less than $25 billion, far below the $40 billion the company had wanted.
Alibaba “has a massive base to work from in terms of customers and data, and that is a treasure trove of any AI operation. They still have some amazing minds in the organization,” former executive Wong said.
“I think all the raw materials are there, it’s question of how do they [execute] this in a time of a critical moment,” he said, noting that to him, Alibaba is “getting its house in order to prepare for the next big thing.”
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Chinese fast fashion retailer Temu overtakes Shein to dominate Japan and South Korea apps
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A package from Temu is seen in front of a screen with the Temu logo. (Photo by Nikos Pekiaridis/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Nurphoto | Nurphoto | Getty Images
Chinese low-cost retailer Temu is dominating app stores in Japan and South Korea in its category, dethroning rival Shein after its successful expansion in Western markets.
“Temu has rapidly expanded its footprint beyond the U.S. and into a number of international geographies and we believe is now available in 40+ countries … where we continue to see opportunities for growth in the quarters ahead,” said Goldman Sachs in an Oct. 4 report.
The investment firm estimated that Temu, which is owned by PDD Holdings, “now generates more than $1 billion of [monthly transaction value]” and expects “continued growth into second half 2023.”
Its rival Shein was estimated to be on track to hit $30 billion in transaction value in 2022, according to media reports.
Temu has overtaken Shein in Japan and South Korea by staying at the top of shopping app rankings in those locations for a longer period of time, according to data.ai analysis shared with CNBC.
Since its July launch in Japan to Nov. 2, “Temu has ranked #1 by daily iOS & Google Play shopping app downloads in Japan for 101 days out of 124 days,” said the app analytics and data company.
By comparison, Shein spent just 17 days topping the two app stores in the same period in Japan.
Temu was the fastest to reach four million downloads in Japan, taking around 121 days, compared to Shein which took 155 days, according to data.ai. Japanese marketplace Mercari took 427 days and Amazon 660 days, the data showed.
Similarly, in South Korea, Temu ranked No. 1 by daily iOS & Google Play shopping app downloads for 65 days out of 93 days from Aug. 1 to Nov. 2, overtaking Alibaba‘s AliExpress (25 days) while Shein ranks among the top 5.
Among the top shopping apps in South Korea, Temu was the fastest to reach 2 million downloads at around 88 days. Shein took 382 days while AliExpress took 366 days to hit the same milestone.
Temu and Shein’s rivalry extend outside the e-commerce space to the courtroom. Shein sued Temu in December over intellectual-property infringement while Temu accused Shein in July of threatening and forcing manufacturers into exclusivity agreements. But recent documents showed that both parties have applied to end their lawsuits against each other.
Temu’s rise
Temu is backed by Nasdaq-listed Chinese tech giant PDD Holdings, which also owns China-based e-commerce app Pinduoduo.
Launched in the U.S. in September 2022, Temu was PDD’s first major push overseas and quickly found success among budget-conscious consumers.
In just a few weeks, the Chinese ecommerce app rose to the top of app stores and subsequently expanded rapidly across countries such as Australia, New Zealand, France, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, and the U.K.
Headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, the Chinese online retailer focuses on selling made-in-China goods, from fashion to household products, at low prices to overseas consumers. Similarly, Shein relies on contracted manufacturers, mostly in China, to design, produce and ship its low-priced products.
Temu made its foray into Asia through Japan and South Korea in July. It then entered the Philippines on Aug. 26 before launching in Malaysia on Sept. 8.
“We believe the main reason for [PDD’s] 131% year-on-year growth in transaction service revenues and 135% year-on-year growth in cost of goods sold in second quarter 2023 was related to fast ramp of Temu performance,” Citi analysts said in a Aug. 29 report.
The platform has been expanding rapidly since its launch by leveraging its parent company’s strength in supply chain and marketing.
“Much of PDD’s incremental investment dollars have been deployed to make Temu happen,” said Bernstein analysts in a Sept. 15 report, adding that Temu’s multi-million Super Bowl advertisement “solidified Temu’s mind share for a number of its target customers.”
“We believe that Temu’s rapid rise in popularity was supported by the company’s elevated marketing investments, its low prices and focus on promotions, and to the success of its referral campaigns,” said Berstein’s analysts.
The analysts said they expect to see “an increase in the number of active users and order volume” in Temu contributing to non-U.S. transaction value and “increasingly contributing to growth from here.”
In June, the U.S. House Select Committee alleged that Shein and Temu violated import tariff law by importing goods into the U.S. without paying import duties or making shipments subject to human rights reviews.
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Shares of Tencent-backed J&T Express fall in lackluster Hong Kong debut
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Courier handing over package asking female customer to do electronic signature, delivering, receiving, efficiency
10’000 Hours | Digitalvision | Getty Images
Shares of Indonesia’s J&T Express fell 1.33% when it went public on Friday.
The logistics service provider traded at 11.84 Hong Kong dollars ($1.51) on Friday morning, after opening at HK$12.
The HK$3.92 billion ($500 million) IPO is the second largest listing in Hong Kong this year, after premium Chinese liquor company ZJLD Group. The Chinese “baijiu” maker, backed by KKR, plunged nearly 18% on their first day of trading on April 27.
Investors include Chinese tech giant Tencent, U.S.-based venture capital firm Sequoia, Chinese private equity firm Boyu, SF Express and Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund Temasek.
J&T Express is listing in an uncertain economic environment, characterized by hiking inflation, high interest rates and ongoing conflict such as the Israel-Hamas war and Ukraine invasion.
“In the third quarter of 2023, global IPO activities remained sluggish due to macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainties. Hong Kong’s global IPO ranking dropped to eighth following a historically slow third quarter,” said KPMG in a report published on Oct. 9.
“The Hong Kong market has not recovered as much as we would like,” Irene Chu, partner at KPMG China, told CNBC, highlighting that the third quarter “continued to be very soft.”
J&T had initially aimed to raise at least $1 billion in the IPO but halved the target amount on weak investor demand, according to Reuters.
Companies that want to go public have “become more realistic” in their pricing, said Ringo Choi, Asia-Pacific IPO leader at EY. “The IPO pricing is dropping significantly by more than 50% or even 70%.”
China is J&T’s largest market, where it delivered nearly 83% of its total parcels last year, serving the likes ecommerce giants like Pinduoduo and Alibaba’s Taobao and Tmall. It held a 10.9% market share by parcel volume in 2022, the company said in its prospectus, citing Frost & Sullivan.
In May, it acquired China-based Fengwang Express for 1.18 billon yuan from largest domestic player SF Express, building on its acquisition of express delivery business from Chinese logistics firm Best in late 2021.
The Indonesian logistics provider delivered a total of more than 14.5 billion parcels in 2022 across China and Southeast Asia, up from 11.5 billion in 2020. In Southeast Asia, it is the largest operator with a 22.5% market share in terms of parcel volume, based on Frost & Sullivan data. Alibaba-owned Lazada, GoTo’s e-commerce arm Tokopedia and Sea Limited‘s Shopee, are among its customers, the prospectus showed.
It posted a net profit of $1.57 billion in 2022 but went into the red in the first six months of this year Net losses came in at $666.8 million, due to gross losses from operations in China and new market expansion in 2022, among others.
“In the long term, to continue to realize our revenue potential and achieve profitability, we plan to further grow our parcel volume and market share, maintain a flexible pricing strategy, control costs, narrow gross loss and improve gross margin, and enhance operating leverage,” said J&T in its prospectus.
‘Immaterial’ impact from TikTok Shop ban
Analysts warn that TikTok Shop’s ban in Indonesia, which disallows social media platforms from facilitating e-commerce purchases, could impact J&T Express.
TikTok Shop is the e-commerce feature of popular short-video app TikTok.
“There is some sharp short-term pain for J&T in Indonesia because of the TikTok Shop ban, as J&T was (profitably) carrying the majority of the TikTok Shop’s millions of orders a day in Indonesia prior to the ban,” said Momentum Works in a Oct. 17 blog post.
J&T Express acknowledged in its filing that “there remain significant uncertainties” on how the new rules would impact different e-commerce and social media platforms in Indonesia, “some of which are our customers.”
But the company said it will not be adversely impacted as the revenue from social e-commerce platforms in Indonesia “remained immaterial” to the business.
In 2022 and the first six months of this year, revenue from social e-commerce platforms in Indonesia contributed only 4% and 6% to the company’s revenue respectively, said J&T.
“We believe that although [the new e-commerce regulation] may have an impact on our customer composition in Indonesia in the near term, this new regulation will not have a material adverse effect on our business operations and financial performance in the long term.”
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Alibaba CEO warns of being ‘displaced’ if the Chinese tech giant doesn’t keep up in AI
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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, one of Alibaba founder Jack Ma’s close confidants, started as CEO on Sept. 10, taking over from Daniel Zhang, who stepped down from the role to focus on heading up the cloud computing business. However, in a surprise move, Zhang this week quit as CEO of the cloud business with Wu taking over in the interim.
It comes months after Alibaba split its company into six different business groups, the biggest shakeup in its history.
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.
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Stocks making the biggest moves midday: Best Buy, Big Lots, Coinbase, Nio and more
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Check out the companies making headlines in midday trading.
Best Buy — Shares popped nearly 6% after the retailer’s fiscal second-quarter earnings beat on both the top and bottom lines. Adjusted earnings per share came in at $1.22, versus the $1.06 expected from analysts polled by Refintiv. Revenue was $9.58 billion, topping the consensus estimate of $9.52 billion. However, Best Buy lowered the top end of its revenue outlook for the year.
Big Lots — The discount retailer surged 26.7% after its earnings report came in better than analysts expected. Big Lots lost $3.24 per share, on an adjusted basis, less than the $4.11 forecasted by analysts surveyed by FactSet. Revenue exceeded the consensus estimate of $1.1 billion, coming in at $1.14 billion.
Coinbase, Marathon Digital, Riot Platforms — Stocks tied to the cryptocurrency industry soared after a court ruled against the Securities and Exchange Commission in a lawsuit about spot bitcoin ETFs. Shares of Coinbase, which is named as a custodial partner in several proposed bitcoin ETFs, jumped 13%. Bitcoin mining stocks also rose, with Marathon Digital surging 24% and Riot Platforms climbing 15%.
3M — Shares gained 2.6% after the company agreed to settle lawsuits regarding potentially defective U.S. military earplugs for $6.01 billion. The deal had grown into the largest mass tort litigation in U.S. history.
Heico — The engine and aircraft part maker retreated 3.1%. Despite beating expectations for revenue in the quarter, the company said its operating margin fell when compared with the same quarter a year ago.
Nio — The Chinese electric vehicle maker slid 5.8% after posting a wider quarterly loss than anticipated. Industry giant Tesla climbed more than 5.4%.
Nvidia — The artificial intelligence stock rallied 4%, part of a broader ascent among technology stocks in Tuesday’s session. Morgan Stanley reiterated its overweight rating on the stock, noting its strong earnings report last week can be a positive signal for the AI supply chain.
PDD Holdings — U.S.-listed shares jumped 17.8%. The Chinese e-commerce company beat Wall Street expectations when reporting second-quarter earnings. It noted a positive shift in consumer sentiment during the quarter.
Oracle — Software giant Oracle climbed 2.9% following an upgrade from UBS to buy from neutral. UBS said the stock could have upside ahead due to tailwinds tied to artificial intelligence.
AT&T, Verizon — The telecommunication giants each added 2.3% on the back of a Citi upgrade to buy. The firm cited stabilization in the wireless environment and said the stocks’ valuations may be over-discounting potential costs tied to mitigating lead-covered cables.
Alphabet, General Motors — Google Cloud and General Motors said Tuesday they’re working together to explore artificial intelligence opportunities across the automaker’s business. Following the announcement, shares of Google Cloud’s parent company Alphabet and General Motors rose 3.5% and 0.6%, respectively, during midday trading.
Catalent — Catalent jumped more than 5% after the biotech company issued a solid revenue outlook and announced a deal with activist investor Elliott Investment Management. For fiscal 2024, Catalent forecasted revenue in the range of $4.30 billion to 4.50 billion, far above the $4.19 billion expected by analysts polled by FactSet. Additionally, Catalent agreed to name four new independent directors to its board, two of whom will be nominated by Elliott. It also agreed to a review of its business and strategy.
Ginkgo Bioworks — The biotechnology company’s stock popped more than 18% after announcing a five-year cloud and AI partnership with Google Cloud. As part of the deal, Ginkgo Bioworks will work to create new large language models for biology and biosecurity uses. Alphabet shares were last up more than 3%.
Rockwell Automation — The industrial stock gained nearly 2% after Wells Fargo upgraded the stock to equal weight from underweight. The Wall Street firm said it’s bullish on Rockwell’s earnings growth potential.
Airbnb — The vacation booking platform climbed 4.8%. Bernstein reiterated its outperform rating and said investors should buy the stock after a recent pullback in share prices.
Palantir – The software stock surged more than 5%. Bank of America reiterated its buy rating on Palantir, calling the company a “key player” in implementing secure AI despite the recent share pullback.
Splunk — Shares of the software company added 1.8% on Tuesday after Jefferies named the company a top pick in a Tuesday note. Jefferies said Splunk is now in position to deliver “mid-teens” increases in annual revenue after a management overhaul that began 18 months ago.
Futu Holdings — The Asian wealth management stock popped 10% following a double-upgrade to buy from underperform by Bank of America. The Wall Street bank said to expect more growth in overseas markets.
NextEra Energy Partners — The energy stock advanced 3.7% on the back of an upgrade from Raymond James to outperform from market perform. Raymond James said investors should buy the dip on the stock.
— CNBC’s Sarah Min, Samantha Subin, Yun Li, Hakyung Kim, Michelle Fox, Pia Singh and Jesse Pound contributed reporting
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China’s Shein denies U.S. IPO rumors
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Two people hold two Shein bags after entering SHEIN’s first physical store in Madrid, Spain, June 2, 2022.
Cezaro De Luca | Europa Press | Getty Images
Chinese fast fashion giant Shein on Friday denied a Reuters report that said it has confidentially filed for an initial public offering in the U.S.
“Shein denies these rumors,” a Shein spokesperson told CNBC.
Reuters, citing sources familiar with the matter, reported the listing could happen before the end of the year.
Founded in 2012 by Chris Xu, the brand rose to global prominence for its budget-friendly and trendy apparel. Shein was recently valued at $64 billion, according to Reuters.
But Shein, as well as Pinduoduo’s budget e-commerce app Temu, have been accused of exploiting trade loopholes to import goods into the U.S. without paying duties or making shipments subject to human rights reviews, according to a report from a U.S. House committee.
Shein told CNBC last week its policy is to “comply with the customs and import laws of the countries in which we operate” and that it will continue to “make import compliance a priority.”
Reuters noted the listing could make Shein the most valuable Chinese company to go public in the U.S. since Didi Global.
In 2021, the ride-hailing giant listed on the New York stock exchange at a $68 billion valuation, but de-listed less than 6 months later due to pressure and data security concerns from Chinese regulators.
In May, U.S. lawmakers urged the SEC to crack down on Shein for allegedly selling clothes made by forced labor in Xinjiang, China.
“We have zero tolerance for forced labor,” a Shein spokesperson had told CNBC in May.
Shein recently hosted a group of influencers at its facilities in Guangzhou, China. While the influencers posted videos praising the company, dismissing allegations of forced labor, many viewers criticized the creators for repeating “propaganda.”
— CNBC’s Penny Chen contributed to this report.
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