Dateline: April 23 2023
If you want to exit from a large, EU-based multinational concern, just sell it to the Chinese. They’re buying. Everything.
In the last five years, Chinese acquisitions and investments in Europe have tripled compared to the previous decade. China’s “economic imperialism” in Africa and Latin America is widely recognised and well documented, but its forays into Europe have been more stealthy.
Published details of deals to acquire or invest in power and logistics, property and football clubs are only the tip of the iceberg. Many private stakes have also been sold to the Chinese, who seem to have unlimited funds and state backing.
Famous brands such as Volvo and Skoda have long since been lost to China, but everything from Swiss pharma to French wine and Dutch shipping now has a large Chinese investment stake, if not control.
Britain is not excluded from this flight of ownership to the East. Chinese companies and their Hong Kong proxies have demonstrated a huge appetite for London properties and UK banking.
“There is no backroom deal; everything is transparent. There is no ‘winner takes all’, but every project delivers win-win results,” said China’s foreign minister back in 2018; but not everyone is convinced.
Despite the urging of Germany and France, the EU has dithered over any formal investment screening, and perhaps this is why Chinese funds have been streaming into Europe rather than other developed markets; there’s so little barrier to entry, and so many willing sellers!
Is this some grand plan for world domination of key economic sectors? Or is it simply that China has excess funds and knows a buyer’s market when it sees it? Whatever the reason, it won’t just be Chinese restaurants that you see on the high street, but owners’ plaques as well.
- First published on Mindbullets, June 7 2018
One Belt for a new world order
China leads the push for Globalisation 2.0
Dateline: July 4 2035
It has taken two decades, but the demise of the US as top nation was predicted way back in 2015. Now China is firmly #1 in economic terms, and the West looks decidedly lower middle class.
The global power shift to the East has been driven partly by demographics, but also by China’s determination to expand its sphere of economic influence and to co-opt key nations en route. Central to this ambition has been the “One Belt, One Road” initiative, which links up dozens of nodes from Guangzhou to Rotterdam in a vast new logistics network.
Since the vision for this new Silk Road was announced in 2016, it has been expanded to involve 68 countries and upgraded for the digital age. Almost all the rail links, seaports and border points are connected by ultrafast digital networks and feature automated tracking and forwarding for global supply chain integration, enhanced with artificial intelligence.
President Xi Jinping’s goal was to pull countries and multinationals into a new economic order dominated by China, and he has succeeded. But the physical and virtual links spanning Asia and Europe have left North America behind.
The US has been desperately trying to revive the Trans-Pacific Partnership, but with so much of China’s funding and development committed to One Belt, only Japan is interested. Although the era of “America First” is long gone, the legacy effects remain a drag on US growth.
Now the heartland of commerce and innovation lies in the rich, abundant markets of eastern Asia while the old leaders in the West struggle to emerge from their isolationist slump. China is the new king of the global hill.
- First published on Mindbullets May 18 2017
• Despite appearances to the contrary, Futureworld cannot and does not predict the future. The Mindbullets scenarios are fictitious and designed purely to explore possible futures and challenge and stimulate strategic thinking.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.