AI’s energy demand is about to go vertical, and in many countries, the grids aren't ready.
China’s building 29 large nuclear reactors right now. The U.S. has none under construction. High costs, regulatory delays and market challenges hold us back, though advanced smaller reactors are emerging. Source: StockMarket.News
The effective US tariff rate on China (red)
The effective US tariff rate on China (red) based on imports and estimated duties paid - has stabilized near 43%, which is up from 17% before Trump 2.0 and up from 5% before Trump 1.0 before that. The effective tariff rate on everyone else (excluding Canada and Mexico) is 14%. Source: Robin Brooks on X
China controls close to 90% of the global rare earth market, and it has a track record of weaponizing exports when tensions rise.
Any new tariffs could invite retaliation, slower licensing, outright restrictions, or targeted disruptions that hit automakers, electronics, and magnet producers with higher costs and production delays. The ripple effects wouldn’t stop there, more expensive inputs could feed inflation and strain global supply chains. The G7 and the EU are weighing new ways to chip away at China’s rare earths dominance. Tariffs or taxes on Chinese exports are on the table along with price floors and subsidies to jump start mining and processing capacity outside Beijing’s reach. Source: StockMarket.news
Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway $BRK.B no longer own any shares of BYD - CNBC
Source: Evan
Interesting theory...
The Shanghai Gold Exchange (SGE) has activated two overseas vaults—one in Saudi Arabia, the other in Hong Kong—marking a direct expansion of RMB-denominated gold trading beyond mainland borders. This move represents a strategic move to enhance China’s gold trading infrastructure and strengthen the SGE’s role in global gold price discovery. These aren’t symbolic moves. They’re operational. They’re live. Source: Alasdair Macleod @MacleodFinance
China economic slowdown deepens in August
➡️ Retail sales rose 3.4% in August from a year earlier, missing analysts' estimates for a 3.9% growth and slowing from July's 3.7% growth. ➡️ China’s industrial output growth slipped 5.2%, the worst performance since August last year. ➡️ Fixed-asset investment, reported on a year-to-date basis, expanded just 0.5%, a sharp slowdown from the 1.6% expansion in the January to July period. ➡️ China's survey-based urban unemployment rate in August came in at 5.3%. Source: CNBC
China’s shipments to the U.S. plunged 33% in August
While overall exports growth slowed to its weakest level in six months, and President Donald Trump’s policy targeting trans-shipments weighed on exports and businesses, frontloading activity lost momentum. 👉Imports from the U.S. also dropped 16% from a year ago, customs data showed. 👉China’s total exports climbed 4.4% in August in U.S. dollar terms from a year earlier, customs data showed Monday, marking their lowest growth since February while missing Reuters-polled economists’ estimates for a 5.0% rise. That growth slowed from the prior two months, in part reflecting the statistical effect of a high base last year when China’s exports grew at their fastest pace in nearly one-and-a-half years. 👉Imports rose 1.3% last month from a year ago, missing Reuters estimates for a 3% growth. Imports rose for a third straight month after returning to growth in June, albeit still muted due to the persistent real estate slump, rising job insecurity, among other things. ➡️ China has increasingly relied on alternative markets, particularly Southeast Asia and European Union nations, Africa and Latin America, as U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade policy has pressured U.S.-bound shipments. Nonetheless, no one country has come close to the U.S. which remains China’s largest trading partner on a single-country basis, absorbing $283 billion of Chinese goods this year as of August. Exports to the EU stood at $541 billion over the same period. Beijing and Washington on Aug. 11 agreed to extend their tariff truce by another 90 days, locking in place U.S. tariffs of around 55% on Chinese imports and 30% Chinese duties on U.S. goods, according to Peterson Institute for International Economist. But bilateral talks appear to be struggling to reach a breakthrough, with a late-August visit to Washington by top Chinese trade negotiator Li Chenggang yielding little progress. Source: CNBC
$BABA Alibaba shares are jumping +18%
The most since 2022, after China’s e-commerce leader posted a triple-digit percentage gain in AI-related product revenue as well as a better-than-anticipated 26% jump in sales from the cloud division. Alibaba’s rally also helped energize the broader AI sphere: Ernie developer Baidu gained as much as 5.8%, while Tencent Holdings also climbed. “Alibaba’s breakout reinforces a broader theme in Asia: while global tech remains preoccupied with geopolitics and valuations, parts of China tech are quietly REACCELERATING—driven not by hype, but by real revenue growth in AI and cloud,” said Charu Chanana, chief investment strategist at Saxo Markets. “This isn’t a broad-based rotation yet—but the divergence is real.” Source: Bloomberg, @neilksethi on X
