📰 Latest News

OpenAI told investors and users that its 2025 annual recurring revenue exceeded $20 billion, driven by nearly tenfold compute growth since 2023 and soaring user engagement. The company is pursuing an aggressive strategy of large upfront compute investments to accelerate research and monetisation, while remaining unprofitable and negotiating huge financing and infrastructure deals.

Yu Minhong has named Chen Xingjia a senior consultant to New Oriental and its livestreaming and cultural arms, offering RMB 1.5 million a year and committing at least RMB 1 million annually to Chen’s Henghui Philanthropy Foundation. The move follows scrutiny of Chen’s previously disclosed foundation salary and signals a strategic effort by New Oriental to shore up social legitimacy while raising questions about governance and transparency in corporate–charity ties.

An Evercore analyst forecasts OpenAI could earn about $25 billion annually from advertising by 2030 if tests of in‑chat ads scale successfully. The move would leverage ChatGPT’s large user base and rich intent signals, but OpenAI faces entrenched competition from Google, privacy and regulatory hurdles, and the challenge of translating scale into profit.

New Oriental founder Yu Minhong appointed former county official and charity founder Chen Xingjia as the education group's chief adviser with a reported annual salary of 1.5 million yuan, while committing at least 1 million yuan a year to Chen’s Henghui Foundation. The move aims to bolster New Oriental’s social credentials but risks renewed scrutiny given recent controversy over Chen’s foundation pay and questions about charity governance in China.

Provincial 2025 banking data show household deposits climbing rapidly across several provinces while household short-term loans shrink, signalling greater risk aversion and subdued consumption. Corporate lending, by contrast, expanded robustly, driven by policy support and firms’ financing needs, leaving regulators with the task of converting high savings into stronger domestic demand.

BAIC BluePark and Anhui Jianghuai expect a combined net loss of at least ¥60 billion for 2025 but are responding by committing over ¥113 billion to joint projects with Huawei’s automotive software and solutions. The strategy mirrors the profitable Huawei partnership seen at Seres, but risks include dependence on a shared platform and dilution of differentiation as more OEMs adopt Huawei’s stack.

China left its LPR unchanged for an eighth straight month on January 20, with the one‑year rate at 3.00% and the five‑year+ at 3.50%. Forecasters warn that worsening export pressures from higher U.S. tariffs could prompt Beijing to follow early targeted easing with a broader policy rate cut in Q2, which would likely push mortgage and corporate lending rates lower.

China’s weather in late 2025 and early 2026 has behaved like a roller coaster as a La Niña state overlays a record-warm world, producing sharp regional swings in temperature and precipitation. The episode is likely to produce uneven but economically meaningful disruptions to agriculture, energy markets and supply chains, serving as a stress test of China’s improved adaptation and emergency management capabilities.

China met its 2025 growth target, recording 5% GDP growth and crossing 140 trillion yuan, while per‑capita GDP rose to about $13,953. The expansion was sharply uneven: high‑tech and equipment manufacturing led the gains even as investment fell and consumer momentum softened, producing a K‑shaped recovery and renewed calls for targeted fiscal and redistributional measures.

De Beers has trimmed diamond prices again as demand weakens, lab-grown stones proliferate and competition intensifies. The cuts, coupled with swelling inventories and producer countries’ interest in buying stakes in the company, signal a structural shift in an industry long governed by supply control and strong branding.

China’s 2025 population data show births falling to roughly 7.92 million and the country’s share of global newborns dipping to about 6.12%. Persistent sub‑replacement fertility and regional disparities mean the population is projected to shrink further, forcing policy shifts toward productivity, social support and possibly immigration.

Rongbai Technology announced a headline RMB120 billion, six‑year supply intention to CATL that the buyer later described as non‑binding and not internally approved. Regulators have opened a formal probe after the company admitted the figure was an estimate and its current capacity falls far short of the volumes implied by the announcement. The incident highlights governance gaps at smaller suppliers and reputational risk for industry leaders amid rapid expansion and cooling prices in China’s LFP market.

Xi Bei will close 102 stores and lay off about 4,000 workers as it faces over RMB 600 million in projected losses, a crisis compounded by a public feud between founder Jia Guolong and influencer Luo Yonghao. The dispute highlights how consumer perceptions, amplified online, can inflict severe damage on dining chains already facing a broad consumption downturn and dimming IPO prospects.

A candid video by Li Yapeng about rent arrears at the Yanran Angel Children’s Hospital triggered a wave of online donations that raised nearly 20 million yuan in days. The surge highlights the power of Chinese social media to mobilise aid quickly but also exposes structural limits: legal separation between fund and hospital, rising urban rents and the need for sustainable funding mechanisms for non‑profit medical providers.

Anhui became the first central Chinese province to surpass 1 trillion RMB in annual trade in 2025, joining eight coastal provinces already in that bracket and reflecting a broader geographic rebalancing of China’s export base. The province’s surge is powered by large‑scale manufacturing — notably automobiles, batteries and photovoltaics — industrial revenue growth, and deeper market diversification into ASEAN and Belt‑and‑Road countries.

South Korean investigators have identified two men, both former staffers in ex‑president Yoon Seok-yeol’s presidential office, as linked to a private drone that entered North Korean airspace. The case has intensified inter‑Korean tensions, prompted a joint military-police probe, and highlights regulatory and security gaps around civilian drone activity.

About 1,500 paratroopers from the US 11th Airborne Division have been placed on alert for possible deployment to Minnesota, a contingency the Army calls prudent planning. Minneapolis's mayor has publicly opposed the move, underscoring the legal and political sensitivities around using active‑duty forces on US soil.

US lawmakers from both parties warned that a unilateral US military seizure of Greenland would pit Washington against NATO and undermine alliance cohesion. They urged congressional constraints on presidential action and highlighted Greenland’s strategic and resource value amid growing Arctic competition.

President Pezeshkian warned that any attack on Supreme Leader Khamenei would be equivalent to an all-out war, reflecting Tehran’s heightened sensitivities after the weakening of its regional alliances. Iran blamed U.S. sanctions and accused the G7 of double standards while pledging to defend public order and sovereignty, a posture that raises the risk of escalation in the Middle East.

A recent US strike has exposed the Western Hemisphere’s uneven defensive posture, revealing how decades of underinvestment and a shift toward internal security have left many states vulnerable to precision long‑range attacks. The incident highlights the need for layered deterrence—technical, organisational and diplomatic—to prevent escalation and reduce strategic dependence.