China- Avoiding the Lime Light

We have already discussed about South Korea and Malaysia.

Another country worth studying is China. When studying the Economic History of China the best era to start with is the era immediately after Deng Xiaopeng.

So that is the era where China really entered into the World after developing itself in a hidden closed den.

Zhu Rongji is the person behind this attempt of balancing the Leninism and the Economic prosperity. The journey to prosperity was not an easy one for Chinese and though many realized their economic power with Zhu, its a tireless effort taken since 1840s.

This is quoted from Wikipedia... about Zhu Rongji




Zhu Rongji (Chinese: 朱镕基; IPA: [ʈʂú ɻǔŋtɕí]; born 1 October 1928) is a Chinese politician who served as Mayor and Party chief in Shanghai between 1987 and 1991, before serving as Vice-Premier and then the fifth Premier of the People's Republic of China from March 1998 to March 2003.

A tough administrator, his time in office saw the continued double-digit growth of the Chinese economy and China's increased assertiveness in international affairs. Rumored to be engaged in a testy relationship with General Secretary Jiang Zemin, under whom he served, Zhu provided a novel pragmatism and strong work ethic in the government and party leadership increasingly affected by corruption, and as a result gained great popularity with the Chinese public. His opponents, however, charge that Zhu's tough and pragmatic stance on policy was unrealistic and unnecessary, and many of his promises were left unfulfilled. Zhu retired in 2003, and has not been a public figure since. Premier Zhu was also widely known for his charisma and tasteful humour

Zhu started to perform as the Mayor of Shanghai and next as the Vice Premier.

He started to redesign 80,000 SOEs. They were run by state bureaucrats following the steps of Stalin since 1950s.

By the time he started to redesing only 50% of the GDP belonged to private enterprise. Most of China's largest and most important economic sectors-banking, energy , transportation and heavy industry were still largely occupied by SOEs , many of which were not only inefficient and un profitable but also heavily reliant on loans from state banks for survival.

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So the fate of SOEs were almost similar to Sri Lanka.

Chinese used nice nick names with SOEs

* Iron Chair - Once a Chairman or a top position is offered to a person in a SOE he will remain irrespective of performance and profitability of the company

* Iron Rice Bowl - Once employed everyone is ensured of salary until retirement and all the securities irrespective of performance and profitability of the company.

* Iron Salary- managers salaries are not linked to the performance of the company

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Once again this is the same situation with Sri Lankan SOE's and we can discuss further on this matter in a political thread with recent developments

Zhu's braze willingness to borrow from abroad even led to the creation of China's first modern investment bank, a joint venture with the Wall street firm Morgan Stanely. And so the China International Capital Corporation (CICC)was born from the union of Morgan Stanley and the China Construction Bank, one of the China's largest state owned banks, and went on to handle China's IPO that put one giant state- owned company after another on global stock exchanges. They included China Telecom, PetroChina,Industrial and Commercial Banks of China (ICBC) in what was the largest IPO in history with a market cap of over $ 22 Billion.

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ICBC IPO was almost like 1/3 of GDP of Sri Lanka.

After mentioning above I would add that by Jan 2016 the first three biggest IPOs are China related...



Alibaba Group’s staggering initial public offering of $25 billion shattered all records and became the largest IPO ever. But how does the Alibaba number compare to other huge IPOs? We have compiled a list of the top 10 IPOs of all time. The list may surprise you. Only one U.S.‑based company made the top five (hint: it wasn’t Facebook). Chinese companies comprise three of the top five IPOs.

Top Ten Global IPOs

1. Alibaba Holdings Group (NYSE:BABA), a diversified online ecommerce company based in China, went public on September 18, 2014 at a whopping $21.8 billion. Four days later, underwriters exercised an option to sell more shares, bringing the total IPO to $25 billion. Although technology companies traditionally list on NASDAQ, Alibaba chose the New York Stock Exchange for its debut and used underwriting primarily from Credit Suisse.



2. ABC Bank, otherwise known as the Agricultural Bank of China (listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange and the Hong Kong Stock Exchange), is one of China’s five largest banks. ABC Bank went public on July 7, 2010 at an initial offering raising $19.228 billion. The follow-on greenshoe offerings from underwriter Goldman Sachs Asia brought the total to over $22 billion.

3. ICBC Bank, or Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange and the Hong Kong Stock Exchange), went public on October 20, 2006, fetching a total of $19.092 billion. At that time, ICBC Bank was the largest mainland Chinese bank and the third large Chinese bank to go public

Sri Lanka which follows " Capitalism" has failed to list the two biggest revenue makers of the country being BoC and People's Bank.

Yet China the " Communist" has listed biggest institutions including state owned banks under the premiership of Zhu Ronjgi.

yellow knife wrote:Sri Lanka which follows " Capitalism" has failed to list the two biggest revenue makers of the country being BoC and People's Bank.

Yet China the " Communist" has listed biggest institutions including state owned banks under the premiership of Zhu Ronjgi.

The trade unions wont like it. Some workers mostly the middle aged ones of these banks are lazy and less skilled. If these banks are going to be listed there will be private shareholders who will have their representatives at board level and below. The lazy workers will protest since cant compete. SLT was taken as an example by a lecturer more than a decade ago although privatization and listing happened. Still SLT somewhat dragged down from its full capacity because of people like this. 

However the protests will be stronger for banks to be listed. If listed no services offered and service levels will improve in time. Then will add more to value to economy , shareholders and a boost to the market. Imagine the increase in capitalization of the market.

Zhu had stayed involved every step of the way , even keeping a telephone hotline open during the IPO for PetroChina in 2000. CICC was rub y Zhu's protege Wan Qishan until his own son Levin Zhu ( Zhu Yunlai) became the CEO in 1989.

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Thus Zhu involved in all activities of economy of China like General Park Chun Hee of South Korea. Further the family business culture was nurtured almost like General Park. However General Park encouraged family businesses or Chaebols of others where Zhu created his own family tree..

Koreans allowed stiff competition and allowed death for those who cannot compete . Even KIA was acquired by Huyndai. Same competition was allowed by Zhu.

Joseph Shcumpeter came with a nice term to management and specially with entrepreneurship " Creative Destruction". Chinese allowed the weak to die.

Zhu created novel financial institutions like CICC , he also allowed others to fail. A shock wave coursed through the financial world in 1999 for instance when he announce the bankruptcy of the gigantic state owned Guangdong International Trust and Investment Corporation (GITIC), with had buried itself in over $ 4 billion of debt. Foreign investors cried foul , demanding that the Chinese government provide a sovereign guarantee of their stakes- some $2 Billion lost capital. But Zhu was implacable, insisting it was their own fouls for making risky investments.

University of Yellow Knife online campus, we are lapping it up. Thanks.

the greater challenge faced Shu: reforming Chinas's massive, bloated state-owned sector itself, whose 80,000 SOEs soaked up the lion's share of Chinas's indigenous investment capital and bank loans. Wu Jinglian, and adviser to Zhu, defined what they were up against as deeply rooted "vested interests", in the state controlled system.

" As late as 1993 most scarce economic resources were still in the hands of the government,and SOEs despite the cat that the state sector accounted for less than half of the GDP", Wu explained " In other words, China was suffering from the hugely wasteful mis-allocation of capital".

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In South Korea the capital and loans were available for few favoured Chaebols ( family businesses) , yet these Chaebols contribution to GDP was equally high.

What if China builds as many Sky Scrapers as required to house the explosion of population after the change in one child policy to two?

The earth may rotate on its axis at a different angle!

May be 45 degrees???

Zhu was attacking state sector from one side and assisting private sector to grow simultaneously. His strategy was criticized by many high rankers. Yet since most sidelined workers of state sector found new jobs and better-quality management did turn around many faltering enterprises.

Now profitability and productivity and not just party loyalty , longevity or service or cronyism helped employees.

Zhu aim was not to give " Shock Therapy" to SOEs like East Germans but to allow state enterprises to sell shares to individuals but to keep the majority of the shares with state control.

Another good thread ++

So, in Sri Lanka, we are still awaiting our own 'Zhu' to be born....

Zhu believed in growing Wealth & Power for the nation-state under the firm grip of the Communist Party.

Zhu was aware to reach Wealth & Power, and in return Chinese greatness require two tracks.
1. Reform
2.Openness

Opening up to the outside is a fundamental state policy.. Zhu insisted. " past proves that the moment we Open up our Development become rapid ".

Foreign capital was pouring in.. permitting the giant U.S.Insurer AIG to open up a branch in China for the very first time, and even more controversially, was trying to meet Washington's demands for entry into the WTO. -critics argued Zhu is selling out China.

If we compare Zhu with Iron Lady Magret Thatcher, Zhu was more strategic.

Iron Lady too wanted to get rid of State Sector dependency after listening to Milton Friedman, the economist. Yet she merely cut the jobs without creating. Thus there massive strikes in UK but not in China where jobs were created.

Iron Lady stood firm even against US during Falkland Wars and she never surrendered the Sovereignty of UK under any circumstances. Even Mossad was afraid of running operations within UK during her era.

Same applies for Zhu regarding national security.

Belgrade

Around dawn on May 8 , 1999 U.S. Air Force B-2 stealth bombers fired five GPS guided missiles at a target din downtown Belgrade, but they slammed not into the alleged Serbian arms trading the CIA said it was targeting but into the Chinese embassy.


Yet this was an unexpected event....

Foreign Minister Qian Qichen agreed that the country was not yet far enough down to ' Wealth & Power" to handle direct confrontation with US.

" We must not enter into frontal military conflict with the United States." he warned. " Only when the country is prosperous and people are strong will we have the strength to back our words with actions " .

Qian and Zhu was persuading to ' avoid the lime light " until the country is ready for that.

Thus on the very first day after the attack both Jiang Zeming the President and Zhu the Prime-minister decided not to make a public statement.

Yet when the popular anger grew they instead sent their youngest colleague in the top leadership Vice Premier Hu Jintao, to be the spokesman.



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This is a good lesson even for companies to handle Crisis situations. When Cyelinco group had issues its Chairman Mr. Lalith Kotelawala himself addressed people at BMICH, where in China during crisis the spokesmanship starts from the lowest level. If the lowest level spokesman ( among the top ranks ) fail to address the issue there is ample of time for the real man to enter.

Hu Jintao later became the President of China with all these experiences to back him. So from another angle succssors of China are made slowly yet steadily. We fail to identify and develop successors in corporates as well as in Political Parties and finally as a nation.

However Chinese People were not happy about the governments actions against US.

It was like mini Opium War moment, and Zhu Rongji was on the hot seat. After all, he had just returned from a controversial trip to Washington, where he had tried and failed, to secure US agreement on the terms of entry for China into the WTO. One Communist party leader even compared the Clinton administration's WTO expectations to Japan's notorious 21 Demands m implying that Zhu was an appeaser in the shameful tradition of Yuan Shikai, who had so abjectly yielded to the Japanese.

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Regarding Opium War there is a movie by the same name and available in youtube.

Regarding Japanese path to Development since Meiji Restoration will be discussed in a separate thread.

Zhu was born before liberalization of China in 1949. He has experienced how his nation was humiliated and bullied by big economic power houses of the world.

First of all he is a patriotic. He never wanted to see his country being humiliated again. Yet he was a visionary who could see the years ahead to come than getting popularity now.

" We all remember since Opium War of 1840, the history of modern China has been a history of humiliation and subjugation by foreign invaders", the Iron Premier declared t one party congress press conference.

" When Japanese-Chinese war broke I was just nine years old. Yet even now I clearly remember how I cried whenever we sang songs about saving our country. I felt a surge of emotion and was ready to die for my country. "

However Zhu persuaded the communist leaders very difficulty that the best way is to ....

first ensure that China becoming simply too significant a global economic power house ever to be humiliated again-a status attainable only through persistent reform, opening up and further development.

And his argument won.

China after thirteen years of  tedious and sensitive negotiation, finally joined WTO in December 2001, setting stage for a decade of even faster growth, fueled by exponential rise in global trade and investment.

Zhu's vision had finally emphatically won out.

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For South Korea and Japan , joining WTO was like a forced effort by US yet for China that was a delayed request finally came true.

Charts often save words...