stlplaceDripped coffee only, available 10 AM to noon Friday March 16 in participating stores in China, as I understand from this Yahoo news people in US already enjoyed it on March 15. Actually I heard it from my coworker first. Please don’t pass on to the people work in Cloud 9, as I don’t like wait in long line 🙂
I mentioned it once in my blog: getting Ren Ming Bi (Chinese Yuan) at China Construction Bank using Bank of America ATM card. I tried it yesterday. It works great. The rate is 7.72, or $194.29 for CNY 1500. Don’t know if there is a transaction fee. The last I heard is there is none. There maybe some limit on how much one can withdraw each day.
BOA and CCB are partners in China. Talking about partners, many foreign banks are partnering with local banks these days, because the China banking industry will open up to foreign banks according to WTO.
I went to ChinaClear, the Chinese securities clearing house. I don’t know what’s the equivalent in the States? I do believe they have something similar but it’s just behind the scenes. In other words, we don’t need to know all the details.
I thought about this for quite a while, debating whether I should joined the party in Shanghai. Finanlly I decided to pull the trigger. I went to China Merchant Bank (招商银行), and opened my stock trading account there (the securities department of CMB). The procedure is very much like that in US. I filled out a bunch of forms, including the acknowledgment of risk, showed my IDs, paid 90 Yuan for the card. I am still waiting for the final approval before I can buy stocks.
(Update 14Mar 4PM Shanghai time) I heard from my broker that I already have securities account (I bought and sold stocks in Shanghai in 1995/97). Because I could not find the old account No. I need to go to 中登公司 to get it straight.
Xinhua Finance Media Limited (XFML) did not turn out to be another Home Inns or New Oriental, at its IPO debut last Friday. Besides the difference of market sentiment then and now, I think the fundamental reason lies within the company and the business itself.
First Xinhua Finance is in the media and advertising business. Note media industry is still heavily regulated in China, this is different from Home Inns’ economy hotel business, which is pretty much a free market (as long as they can secure the building).
These days we can see many realtors along the Shanghai streets. The business must be good at least on rental side. I see more than 6 brokers on this 100 meters long Chang Ning Road, some even with US name (Coldwell Banker).
Well, Xinhua Finance Media Limited XFML IPO nearly broke my heart, kind as I expected. The good thing is WR Hambrecht only allocated me 100 shares, out of 200 shares I indicated to buy.
On a positive note, Mindray reported a good quarter and a good year. Here is the results. Going forward they expect “total net revenues for full year 2007 to be in the range of RMB2,120.0 million to RMB2,150.0 million”, this is about 40% revenue growth over 2006. The international market will be the key growth driver; domestic market is picking up after last year’s anti-corruption campaign.
Interestingly, the market decided to hold a sell off on MR today.
Mutual fund is a hot commodity in China these days, as the domestic stock market became really hot in last year. While the mutual fund industry is still in its early stage, I found this Harvest Fund to be impressive. I watched an interview of its manager, Mr. Zhao Xue Jun, at CBN (No. 1 Cai Jing, my default TV setting these days). Here is Harvest Fund (Jia Shi in Chinese) home page and here is an interview of Mr. Zhao by No. 1 Cai Jing News.
To a large extent, the Chinese economy growth in recent years is attributed to the growth in the real estate market. Ten years ago, when I left Shanghai for graduate study in US, I remember most people still live in the apartment assigned by their “Danwei”.
There are lots of discussions about living cost in Shanghai, such as this one from Wang Jianshuo. I am not going to do a comprehensive study here, but I want to share my findings after spending one week in Shanghai.
I rent a one bedroom apartment near Zhongshan park, it cost me CNY 2,300. Because I stay for short term, they charge me a little higher. I think for a one year lease it will be 2,000 Yuan a month. A comparable apartment in St. Louis will cost about $500. So 2000 Yuan vs. 500 dollars. We can say one dollar is really worth 4 Yuan, not the offical rate of 7.75?
