China’s Panda Power Shuffle. Can You be Too Clever for Politics? And Carbon Sucking Cars That Don’t Suck – Plus more!

Grüezi!?I’m Adrian Monck, and welcome to this newsletter featuring seven things that caught my attention this week.

This newsletter is taking a two week vacation. See you in a couple of weeks.

Also this edition – more clever ways to cut carbon!

Sharing is caring –?Please share this newsletter!

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1?? China Changes

Who’s coming, who’s going, in China’s power panda shuffle?

Plenty of guesses, but China scholar Yang Zhang is no Nostradumbass. Here’s his take on what we’ll see in October:

• “Will Xi start a third term? Absolutely. Don’t believe Premier Li Keqiang will replace Xi, or Xi will semi-retire like Jiang did in 2002, or the ‘China Coup’ rumour.
• “Will he designate a successor? Very unlikely. He’s 69 and will effectively rule China for another 10-15 years. His future successor is now a middle-rank official.
• “Next Premier? Probably CPPCC chairman Wang Yang. Intelligent and personable.
• “An ‘all-Xi’ Politburo ‘inner circle’? Likely. If Li Keqiang retires and Hu Chunhua is not offered a seat, then all three incoming Politburo members will be Xi’s men.
• “The four candidates: Beijing’s Cai Qi, Shanghai’s Li Qiang, Chongqing’s Chen Min’er, and Party General Secretary Ding Xuexiang from Central Office.
• “The real struggle just started. There wasn’t perfect unity under Mao or Deng; nor will there be under Xi.”

Last weekend buzzed with rumours of a coup in China, this is a funny thread from a German reporter based in Beijing:

???Emerging markets have a unique opportunity to shape climate action.

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2?? Problems of a Cerebral Finance Minister

A laughing economic egghead gets hard-boiled by financial markets.

Britain’s most educated finance minister? That would be Kwasi Kwarteng – Cambridge and Harvard economic historian, author of a PhD on currency debasement and a well-reviewed popular history of money:

• “Politicians have often been criticised for lacking a long view of history...
• “Kwarteng might not know how to stabilise a financial system that floats on credit, but he certainly understands the forces and the mistakes that have led to that destabilisation.”

Would academic smarts translate into policy success?

Kwarteng had his chance to find out with a bold announcement of cuts in taxes and regulations to stimulate Britain’s sluggish growth. It has put the cerebral Chancellor (as we Brits call finance ministers) in the eye of a financial and political storm.

Announcing that you are reducing the tax take is a signal to investors who have bought your existing debt to find somewhere else to put their cash.

Announcing that you are doing it by reducing taxes on the richest is a signal to not-so-rich voters to find somewhere else to put their cross on the ballot paper.

So Kwarteng finds himself in a double bind. International capital markets are going to make his job tougher in the short term. Voters might decide to get rid of him and his colleagues in the not-so-long term.

Over the summer, Kwarteng’s predecessor as finance minister, Rishi Sunak, was mocked for making these claims about the effect of his rival’s policies:

• “There will be a run on sterling. The gilts market will be in freefall. And the FTSE will tumble as global investors take fright and sell off every form of British asset.
• “It might take only a few days, or the government might stagger through until the end of September, but before long Liz Truss and her new Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng will have been forced to call in the IMF to stabilise a collapsing economy.
• “That is, at least, according to the former Chancellor Rishi Sunak.”

Sunak has subsequently stayed silent.

Meanwhile, Adam Tooze, no political fan, says the criticism heaped on Kwarteng is a sign of a deeper problem for any politician challenging financial orthodoxy...

???Not just Britain: why we might be heading for a global recession.

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3?? China’s Trackless Trams

Just don’t call them buses!

??China is also a leader in the electric vehicle revolution.

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4?? Carbon Neutral Jet Fuel?

This tower could power future flights.

???Top takeaways from the Sustainable Development Impact Meetings.

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5?? The Car That Captures Carbon

It’s also electric, so no gas station queues.

??25 ways to boost clean energy technologies.

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6???The World’s Longest Underwater Tunnel

Coming soon to link Germany and Denmark. A boon to bacon smugglers!

???This also could be coming soon: net-zero steel.

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7?? If All the Financial News has Been Too Much...

Some classic British comedy from the 1990s.

And British social media users demonstrated that self-mockery is stronger than the pound sterling.

If you enjoy this newsletter – please recommend it!

Best,

Adrian

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