The logistics industry is expected to contract 10 per cent this year due to the economic downturn caused by the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak, the Thai Transportation and Logistics Association (TTLA) said.
TTLA chairman Chumpol Saichua added that usually the industry expanded every year in line with economic growth. The sector accounts for 14 per cent, or Bt2 trillion, of the country’s gross domestic product of Bt16 trillion.
Around 80 per cent of the country’s logistics system is land transport, 10 per cent waterway transport, 2 per cent track based and the rest aviation.
He added that the government should provide soft loans to the sector, as many of the operators are hardly able to access loans.
He said that now express delivery service is seeing a boom because of increasing online shopping. Most of the players in the express delivery service are foreign companies.
The Bank of Thailand (BOT) wants commercial banks to respond to its relief measure by cutting their customer fees and easing loan conditions.
The central bank is monitoring how banks respond after it allowed them to reduce their contribution to the Financial Institutions Development Fund (FIDF), said Ronadol Numnonda, deputy governor at the Bank of Thailand.
Banks were recently permitted to halve their FIDF contributions from 0.46 to 0.23 per cent of their deposit base for two years, this year and next year.
“The central bank is interested in whether banks share this gain with customers, and we found that some banks still have room to do more,” Ronadol said.
The BOT has asked commercial banks to submit plans on how they will respond to their contribution reduction, for instance by cutting fees for cash payment, cutting interest rates, or reducing other charges for consumers, he said. Income from such fees contributes significantly to bank revenue, he pointed out.
“Banks have not yet fully transferred this cost-reduction gain to customers,” said Ronadol.
He added that banks have maintained resilience despite the Covid-19 impact, with an average BIS adequacy capital ratio of 19.2 per cent, compared with the minimum requirement of 8 per cent. The average ratio of reserves to non-performing assets is also high, at 144 per cent.
And in contrast in contrast to the 1997 financial crisis when people panicked and withdrew money, the current virus-hit economy has seen people depositing more money with banks, Ronadol said.
The BOT recently asked banks to conduct stress tests for their businesses over the next three years based on the projected 8.1 per cent economic contraction this year and a worst-case scenario of 12 per cent.
Meanwhile the BOT is seeking to speed up the Bt500-billion soft loan scheme for small and medium sized enterprises, since only Bt110 billion has been lent out so far.
The BOT wants banks to lend more to existing debtors whose collateral value is much higher than their loans. Debtors who have borrowed money at a loan-to-value (LTV) ratio of 60 to 70 per cent should be able to access to soft loans, he said. Banks must explain why this group of debtors were not accessing soft loans, he added.
“Is it because the economy is recovering, so they don’t need more loans? Or because they don’t want to pay the 2 per cent interest rate?”, he asked.
The BOT wants to know in depth about this issue and banks are expected to explain within one or two weeks, he added.
Thai Vietjet launches new Ubon Ratchathani flights by offering Bt50 fare to all local destinations
Sep 07. 2020
By The Nation
Thai Vietjet is launching its new Bangkok to Ubon Ratchathani flights by offering a Bt50 fare, excluding taxes and fees, on all its domestic flights for travel between October 6 and March 31, 2021 (excluding public holidays).
Bookings need to be made before Friday (September 11) at SkyFUN.vietjetair.com, the airline’s Facebook page or mobile app.
The promotion is applicable to all domestic Thai Vietjet flights, including Bangkok to Ubon Ratchathani, Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai, Phuket, Krabi, Udon Thani, Hat Yai, Khon Kaen and Nakhon Si Thammarat. The promotion is also applicable to Phuket-Chiang Rai, Udon Thani-Chiang Rai flights, as well as flights to Surat Thani, which start from November 4, and Chiang Rai-Hat Yai, which start from November 1.
Thai Vietjet is expanding its flight network within Thailand and neighbouring countries. Apart from its 13 domestic routes, it also flies to eight destinations in the region, including China.
Johnson warns E.U. not to expect compromise on trade talks
EconSep 07. 2020Boris Johnson. MUST CREDIT: Bloomberg photo by Simon Dawson
By Syndication Washington Post, Bloomberg · Stuart Biggs · WORLD, EUROPE
Boris Johnson will tell the European Union he’s prepared to walk away from trade talks rather than compromise on what he regards as a core principle of Brexit, and the feeling has grown on both sides that a breakthrough will prove impossible when negotiations resume in London this week.
The British prime minister will on Monday set the Oct. 15 European Council meeting as the deadline for a deal. And he’ll say the U.K. is prepared to end the Brexit transition period without one, if necessary, at year’s end – a scenario he’ll describe as a “good outcome,” his office said in an emailed statement.
“There is still an agreement to be had,” Johnson will say, pledging that his government will work hard through September and urging the bloc to “rethink” its positions. “But we cannot and will not compromise on the fundamentals of what it means to be an independent country to get it.”
A European diplomat, who spoke on the condition of anonymity according to policy, said informal consultations ahead of this week’s talks yielded no shift in positions. A second diplomat said the view in Brussels is that there’s a fight between Brexit realists and Brexit ideologues in the British government, and it’s uncertain which side will prevail.
Meanwhile a spokesperson confirmed that the government is “considering fall-back options” in case it cannot resolve “outstanding issues” in the Brexit withdrawal agreement related to Northern Ireland.
The Financial Times reported that a planned internal market bill to ensure smooth trade between the four U.K. nations will override key parts of the withdrawal agreement on state aid and Northern Ireland customs – a move people familiar with the plans told the newspaper will undermine prospects of a trade deal.
The U.K. will revert to trading with its biggest market on terms set by the World Trade Organization if there’s no agreement in place by Dec. 31. That means the return of certain tariffs and quotas, as well as extra paperwork for businesses. Though the British government describes that as an “Australia-style” agreement, it’s an outcome feared by British businesses who warn of severe disruptions to vital just-in-time supply chains.
– – –
On Monday, Johnson will say that in the absence of a deal, the U.K. will be “ready to find sensible accommodations on practical issues,” including aviation, haulage, and scientific cooperation, according to his office.
The two sides have been at an impasse for months over state aid and fisheries. The European Union is seeking to keep the access its fisherman currently have to U.K. waters to protect jobs and coastal communities, while Britain wants reduced access for E.U. boats and to make it conditional on regular negotiations.
On state aid, or “level-playing-field regulations,” Johnson’s government wants the freedom to chart its own course, while the European Union is demanding to know what the British government plans to ensure fair competition.
Negotiators have scheduled eight-hours of talks on both issues this week, according to an agenda published on Friday.
On Sunday, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab accused the bloc of trying to undermine the U.K.’s Brexit decision by keeping it bound to the rules of the European Union’s single market.
– – –
“This week is an important moment for the E.U. to really effectively recognize that those two points of principles are not something we can just haggle away – they are the very reasons we are leaving the E.U.,” Raab told Sky News. He said the issue of state aid is a “point of principle” for the U.K. rather than an indication the government is preparing major interventions.
“I don’t think the E.U. should be worried about that,” he said.
There’s pessimism in Brussels about the prospects of a breakthrough, and for now, Brexit isn’t on the agenda of the Sept. 24 E.U. summit.
Michel Barnier, the bloc’s top negotiator, said last week that he was “worried” and “disappointed” by the current state of the talks, saying Britain would need to shift its position to reach an agreement.
The European Union also responded to reports in the British media that Barnier is being sidelined in an attempt to push forward a trade agreement, calling them “unfounded rumors.”
“Whoever wants to engage with the EU on Brexit needs to engage with Michel Barnier,” Sebastian Fischer, a Brussels-based spokesman for the German government, whose country holds the EU presidency, said in a tweet over the weekend.
The two sides are at loggerheads on how to negotiate, with the European Union demanding progress on all issues and the United Kingdom seeking initial agreements on less contentious points to build momentum toward a final deal.
– – –
But ahead of the meetings, the United Kingdom’s chief negotiator, David Frost, warned that his side would “not blink,” and contrasted Johnson’s steadfast approach with that of his direct predecessor, Theresa May. British officials have also repeatedly complained about the European Union’s position.
“A lot of what we are trying to do this year is to get them to realize that we mean what we say and they should take our position seriously,” Frost said in an interview with The Mail on Sunday.
The standoff comes amid warnings from British businesses, particularly the haulage industry, about the United Kingdom’s ability to mitigate disruption at ports.
Raab told the BBC on Sunday that earlier planning for a no-deal Brexit and the measures put in place during the coronavirus pandemic have put the United Kingdom “in a much stronger place” to handle the risks. “But we’d much rather have a deal with the E.U.”
Job gains Photo by: The Washington Post — The Washington Post
By The Washington Post · Heather Long · BUSINESS, PERSONAL-FINANCE, US-GLOBAL-MARKETS As the United States suffers the worst economic downturn in nearly a century, a key question remains: How quickly can the nation recover, and who has the better track record to get us there?
The dire job losses from the spring are close to half recovered, but 13.6 million workers remain unemployed. Stocks are back near record highs, but food bank lines are long and evictions in parts of the country are growing.
GDP Photo by: The Washington Post — The Washington Post File Size: 0.09 Mb
The 2020 presidential election will be, at least partly, about the economy. President Donald rump argues the economy was soaring pre-pandemic and he can bring it back again, while former vice president Joe Biden, the Democratic nominee, argues the nation wouldn’t be in such bad shape if Trump hadn’t fumbled the handling of the pandemic. Biden says he can get people working again and points to the Obama administration’s track record after the Great Recession. Trump portrays the Obama era as sluggish.
Middle-class income Photo by: The Washington Post — The Washington Post
Perhaps the best case Trump can make for improvement since he took office is higher wages and a boost in confidence. The average worker’s pay finally grew more than 3% a year under Trump, and there was a drop in the number of Americans on food stamps. Consumer and business confidence also jumped after Trump’s election and remained high after the GOP tax cuts took effect in 2018. As recently as February, many Americans rated this as the best economy since the late 1990s. Now those gains are wiped out.
Wages Photo by: The Washington Post — The Washington Post
The pandemic recession triggered more than 22 million job losses, modern-day bread lines and millions of pay cuts. Even before the pandemic hit, the picture was mixed. Manufacturing, business investment and growth were slowing noticeably heading into 2020.
While there’s ongoing debate about how much influence presidents really have over the economy, the charts below illustrate the trends under then-President Barack Obama and Trump.
Photo by: The Washington Post — The Washington Post File Size: 0.08 Mb
1. Job gains (and losses)
The United States experienced some of its best years of job gains in 2014 and 2015 in Obama’s second term when the economy added over 225,000 jobs a month. Employment continued to be strong under Trump – until the pandemic hit.
Average monthly job gains under Trump peaked at 193,000 in 2018. Economists call this very robust, especially given the recovery was nearly a decade old by then. But the devastation from the pandemic wiped out a decade worth of jobs gains in the spring. By August, 48% of the jobs had returned.
Black jobs Photo by: The Washington Post — The Washington Post File Size: 0.08 Mb
2. Economic growth
Trump says he had the “greatest economy in history” during the GOP convention, a claim fact checkers quickly marked as false. A look at economic growth shows why.
The economy grew just shy of 1% in Obama’s first term when the Great Recession took its toll. Growth improved to 2.3% in Obama’s second term. Under Trump, the economy is on track to average slightly above zero in his first term because of the sharp losses from the pandemic.
Excluding 2020, growth in Trump’s initial three years in office was 2.5% – barely above Obama and well below the growth under the Clinton, Reagan and Johnson administrations.
3. U.S. unemployment
The U.S. unemployment rate hit a half-century low of 3.5% in late 2019 and stayed around that level through February 2020. Trump frequently touted the job news, though he often left out that the unemployment rate was a fairly low when he took office (4.7%) and has been steadily declining since 2011.
As the pandemic escalated, Trump and other officials opted to close down much of the economy to keep people home to slow the spread of the deadly coronavirus. This caused the official unemployment rate to soar to nearly 15% in April. The Labor Department had trouble doing its usual worker surveys during the pandemic and says the unemployment rate likely reached as high as 19.7% – a level not seen since the Great Depression. But as the economy reopened, many jobs came back. By August, the unemployment rate had fallen to 8.4%, a level that’s still high but not unprecedented.
4. Black unemployment rate
Trump has started making the claim that his administration has done more for African Americans than “any president since Abraham Lincoln,” which The Washington Post Fact Checker gave Four Pinocchios. A key part of Trump’s argument is the Black unemployment rate, which hit the lowest level ever recorded – 5.4% – in August 2019. (The Labor Department began tracking the Black rate in 1972).
When Trump took office, Black unemployment was 7.5%. Many of the job gains under Trump did go to Black and Hispanic workers, especially women. As the labor market tightened, many employers gave a chance to workers they were not looking at before, such as those without college degrees. The pandemic, however, has hit Black and Hispanic workers the hardest, erasing many of the gains it took years to see after the Great Recession. In August, the Black unemployment rate was 13%.
5. Middle-class income
Middle-class households were hit hard during the Great Recession. For years, their incomes remained lower than in the late 1990s, once the cost of living was taken into account. While incomes rose the most during the final two years of Obama’s term, median household income did not officially equal its 1999 level until 2018, according to the U.S. Census.
Economists generally credit Obama with getting the recovery solidly underway and Trump with keeping it going until the pandemic recession. The steady job and pay gains in recent years have been the biggest drivers of rising middle-class incomes.
6. U.S. stock market
One of Trump’s favorite indicators is the U.S. stock market. Even with the deep blow of the pandemic that caused a 30% drop in stocks in March, the market has come roaring back this summer. The Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index recently surpassed its pre-pandemic record level thanks largely to surging tech stocks such as Apple, Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, Microsoft and Google’s parent, Alphabet. The index has fallen some in the past week.
Many economists are quick to point out the stock market is not the economy. Analysts also note that stocks gained more in Obama’s first term than Trump’s. But that comes with a caveat: Stocks began Obama’s presidency in a deep slump from the financial crisis and then began an epic rebound a few weeks into his presidency. The market was already high when Trump took office and has climbed higher since then. Though Obama had better market gains, both presidents have been good for Wall Street.
7. Food stamps
While the stock market was quick to soar under Obama, many people were quick to point out that the United States still had record numbers of Americans on food stamps, a sign of the lingering pain of the Great Recession. By 2013, roughly 1 in every 6 Americans was on government food aid. That declined only slightly by the end of Obama’s tenure.
The Trump administration made it a goal to get the number of Americans on food stamps down, including by tightening rules about who is eligible for food aid. As a result of more stringent eligibility rules and more job gains in recent years, the number of Americans on food stamps dropped to 35.7 million in 2019 – the lowest level since 2009. The pandemic has ushered in deep hardship again, causing many Americans to seek food stamps and visit food banks for the first time. Photos of long lines of cars waiting outside food banks during the pandemic have been dubbed modern-day bread lines.
8. Manufacturing output
The end of Obama’s second term saw a mini manufacturing recession that deeply hurt blue-collar workers even as the service economy continued to chug along. Trump vowed to revive factories. Early on in his presidency, manufacturing jobs and output jumped. In 2018, manufacturing jobs were growing at the fastest clip since the early 1980s. But it didn’t last.
Manufacturing output and jobs stalled in 2019, an early warning sign of economic trouble. The pandemic was a major blow. Real-time indicators show some rebound in manufacturing, especially as auto sales and home sales have bounced backed. But manufacturing employment remains more than 700,000 jobs below pre-pandemic levels.
9. U.S. home prices
Home prices have been on a steadily upward climb even since bottoming out in 2011. A lot of this growth has been driven by the Federal Reserve. The Fed has kept interest rates low, which has led to historic lows in mortgage rates that have made home-buying more affordable for many families (as long as they have savings for a down payment).
Even the pandemic didn’t put much of a dent in home purchases. In fact, some city dwellers have been rushing to the suburbs in search of bigger homes with more space. That trend, combined with a surge in millennials buying homes and mortgage rates below 3%, have fueled a housing boom. The median home price in the United States hit $304,100 in July, according to the National Association of Realtors. It’s the highest price on record, surpassing the prior 2006 high in inflation-adjusted terms.
10. U.S. government debt
Both Obama and Trump have been criticized for growing the national debt. Spending increased under Obama as the federal government tried to revive the economy after the Great Recession, as well as fund the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and continuing most of the Bush tax cuts.
Trump’s 2017 tax cut added about $1.5 trillion more to the debt, contrary to claims by the president’s administration that it would not. Then the pandemic hit and the federal government responded with more than $3 trillion in aid. The result is the national debt is at the highest levels since World War II. The closely watched debt-to-GDP ratio, a sign of how big U.S. debt held by the public is relative to the economy, is on track to surpass 100% in the coming months.
Many economists say the bulge in spending after the Great Recession and pandemic recession were necessary and unavoidable, but they fault Obama and Trump for not doing more to right the federal budget during the good economic years.
11. Consumer confidence
Consumer spending drives about 70% of the U.S. economy. Many economists and business leaders closely watch signs of consumer confidence to see if Americans are likely to keep buying. The two main gauges of consumer confidence are monthly surveys by the Conference Board and the University of Michigan. Both showed an increase in confidence after Trump’s election, largely because Republicans and Independent voters rated the economy more highly.
As the unemployment rate continued to decrease, confidence hit levels not seen since the late 1990s in early 2020. Though much of the economy under Trump looked similar to under Obama, many Americans appeared to feel better about their job and business prospects. Then the pandemic hit, causing confidence to tank. Nearly 1 in 3 Americans now worries about losing their job, according to Gallup.
12. Wages
While the economy did a big U-turn under Obama, his administration admitted that its “unfinished business” was seeing wages grow faster again. When the economy is performing well, it’s usually hard for employers to find enough workers, and they start lifting pay by more than 3% a year. That did not happen in the Obama era. It took until the summer of 2018 to finally see average hourly earnings rising above 3%.
13. Gas prices
Gas prices were well above $3 a gallon for much of Obama’s tenure. Many Americans see these prices as they drive to work, and it influences their overall feeling about the economy. As prices rise, they tend to feel gloomier as gas costs eat into their weekly pay. But oil prices plunged in 2014 as the world’s major oil-producing countries, such as Saudi Arabia, refused to cut back production, leading to a glut of oil on the world market.
When Trump took office, gas prices were just $2.37 a gallon, on average. They have remained low throughout Trump’s first term, helping keep costs manageable for many Americans. Though Trump likes to tout that America is now “energy independent” because it exports oil again, the reality is the nation still depends on imports of crude oil from abroad. The rise and fall of gas prices are largely driven by the world market and power players like Saudi Arabia that have continued to pump cheap oil.
14. Americans with health insurance
Obama made it one of his top goals to get more Americans covered by health insurance. The number of Americans lacking health insurance went from more than 48 million people in 2010 down to 28 million after the passage of the Affordable Care Act.
The uninsured rate has remained low under Trump, though it ticked up slightly after Trump did away with the penalty for American adults who don’t buy health insurance. Trump also made it a goal to repeal the Affordable Care Act, but that has not happened in his first term.
15. Business investment
An ongoing problem for the U.S. economy in recent years has been sluggish business investment. The economy tends to perform better when firms spend more on new research, products and equipment, since that tends to lead to more innovation.
Business investment was slow at the end of Obama’s second term. Trump and many Republicans said their 2017 tax cut would spur a business investment boom. Though 2018 did see improved business investment, the bump was short-lived. Business investment was anemic again in 2019, even before the pandemic’s economic blow.
16. Trade deficit
Most economists paid little attention to the trade deficit before Trump ran for office. The United States has purchased more goods from abroad than it has sold for years, largely because American consumers like to shop. Economists didn’t worry about this because foreign nations would turn around and invest in America, so the dollars typically came back, one way or another.
But Trump insisted deficits were a sign of weakness. He promised his trade deals would get the deficit back down. What happened instead is the overall trade deficit in 2018 was the largest in a decade.
The trade deficit is on track to come down in 2020 but not for particularly encouraging reasons. Trade deficits tend to shrink during recessions, as Americans save more and shop less.
Factory owners hiking pay to lure workers even with high jobless rate
EconSep 07. 2020In a Chicago suburb, e-commerce retailer Jim Tuchler is trying to beat competitors by boosting starting pay to $14.25 an hour from $12, plus offering bonus pay for sticking around. CREDIT: Bloomberg photo by Olivia Obineme
By Syndication Washington Post, Bloomberg · Michael Sasso · BUSINESS, US-GLOBAL-MARKETS, CAREER-WORKPLACE As the economy picks up, America’s warehouse and factory owners increasingly find they can’t fill jobs without boosting meager wages.
E-commerce is driving a surge of orders, with U.S. manufacturing expanding in August at its fastest pace since late 2018. That has employers racing to bulk up staff to keep production rolling and satisfy demand.
“Ultimately it’s going to be a permanent change that these lower-end workers are going to get more money,” said Mike Skordeles, an economist with SunTrust Banks Inc. People won’t relocate or travel great distances for a low-paid job, so wages will have to rise, he said.
Jobs numbers released Friday, ahead of the long Labor Day weekend to celebrate American workers, showed that while the unemployment rate dropped more than expected – to 8.4% – millions are still without work.
In a Chicago suburb, e-commerce retailer Jim Tuchler expected the pandemic would at least bring a little relief in the competition for talent at his firm, Gifts For You. He immediately needs 10 more workers to help engrave and ship personalized gifts.
He previously just aimed to match market wages but this year he’s trying to beat competitors by boosting starting pay to $14.25 an hour from $12, plus offering bonus pay for sticking around.
Pay increases are surfacing against a bleak backdrop. While joblessness has fallen from its April peak above 14%, it’s still at a high level.
“It just doesn’t make sense,” said Richard Wahlquist, chief executive of the trade group American Staffing Association. “It’s an employment market like no one in our industry has ever seen.”
The labor-shortage paradox comes even as manufacturing employment is still down around 720,000 workers since before the pandemic started in February, said Chad Moutray, chief economist at the National Association of Manufacturers.
It suggests the ample supply of available labor hasn’t necessarily cured the nation’s skills gap, where workers don’t have the qualifications employers need, and the pandemic probably will speed up the use of robotics that’s already under way, Moutray said.
Online retailer CJ Pony Parts in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, tries to fulfill orders from Ford Mustang and Jeep fanatics the same day it receives them. A shortage of workers, though, is keeping it from hitting its goal by 40% some days, said President Mike Large.
“You’ve got every temp agency on speed dial and no one shows up,” he said.
For now, staffing firm Hire Dynamics, based in a north Atlanta suburb, has orders to fill more open jobs than at anytime in its history, Chief Executive Officer Billy Milam said. Many of his clients have introduced $2-an-hour pandemic bonuses on top of the usual $12 wage, with one offering a $5-an-hour hike for a short period to recruit workers.
Milam’s firm recently put up a tent outside its strip mall storefront to host “drive-up” job fairs. Potential employees afraid of contracting Covid-19 could apply without leaving their cars.
The pay hikes at many warehouses and factories around the country track with broader, recent figures showing wages are rising the most in low- and middle-income jobs.
On Sept. 2, the Federal Reserve’s Beige Book survey reported that “firms continued to experience difficulty finding necessary labor, a matter compounded by day care availability, as well as uncertainty over the coming school year and jobless benefits.”
The federal government’s weekly $600 stipend for jobless workers at the outset of the pandemic is a sore spot for many manufacturing and staffing executives, who insist it has thwarted their hiring efforts. The benefit expired July 31, although President Donald Trump last month signed an executive order that provides an extra $300 to most recipients and some states have begun paying out the additional sum.
Another factor impacting available labor is the large number of furloughed employees expecting to be called back to their former jobs.
In August, 45% of the jobless considered their status short-term, far higher than the about 15% who ordinarily consider their unemployment temporary, said Jed Kolko, chief economist at jobs site Indeed.
Still, some workers stand ready to sign on if the money is right.
Haley Marketing, a consultant to the staffing industry, recently studied warehouse jobs in eastern Pennsylvania and found that applicants responded to high pay even during the pandemic. Jobs paying $12-$14 an hour received 45% fewer applicants from May to July than they did during the same period last year, but positions paying $17 an hour got 25% more response from a year ago.
Energy Minister Supattanapong Punmeechaow has called on the Department of Mineral Fuels to see when it will be the best time to hold a new round of bidding for the exploration of petrol and concession on production, a source said.
Since the department plans to call the bids this year, the minister said he doubts if many potential bidders will join, given the low global demand of oil and low price of crude oil.
The minister believes it will be better to launch the bids once the global price of oil picks up, the source added.
The department had initially planned to announce the bid in April this year.
Thailand has not put petrol-related concessions up for bidding for the past 13 years.
Resumption of tourism between China and Thailand ‘not happening any time soon’
EconSep 07. 2020Yang Xin, minister counsellor and deputy chief of mission at the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China to Thailand
By The Nation
A senior official of the Chinese embassy in Bangkok has ruled out early reopening of tourism between China and Thailand, as the two countries are not ready to open the sector.
China has been recently reopening for domestic tourism, but has not yet welcomed foreign tourists, or urged Chinese people to travel abroad, said Yang Xin, minister counsellor and deputy chief of mission at the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China to Thailand.
Even Chinese tourists want to visit Thailand, but Thailand is unlikely to open for foreign tourists, he said in an exclusive interview to Nation Multimedia Group.
The Thai government has not yet reopened the tourism sector, as it was still worried about potential import of new Covid-19 cases. The government only plans to allow first 200 long-stay tourists to enter the country next month. About 10 million Chinese tourists visited Thailand annually in recent years out of some 40 million every year.
Yang said that China was currently reopening travel for business persons who could apply for fast lane clearance when they enter China for doing business. Foreign business persons are not subject to 14-day quarantine but they can visit only limited places essential for their business activities.
He said the Chinese government has managed to control the Covid-19 outbreak and now schools nationwide have been reopened after they were closed for eight months.
China this year has not set a target for economic growth but would focus on job creation and people’s living standards, he said.
The government has implemented many stimulus packages to support people and businesses especially small and medium-sized enterprises, said Yang.
Regarding Hong Kong, Yang said that the special administrative region had returned to stability following the enforcing of the security law. He reiterated that China wants to maintain the one country, two systems principle, but foreign interference was trying to create a two-country system.
Brokerage firms in stock and futures exchange markets have urged the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to cut trading fees in the capital market to help their businesses.
SEC held a meeting with brokerage firms’ top management in the stocks and futures exchange markets at the end of August to hear their comments on operating securities business, mitigate difficulties to increase flexibility, and set up guidelines to support business in the future.
The brokerage firms’ top management urged SEC secretary-general Ruenvadee Suwanmongkol to review trading fee calculations in the capital market because the SEC and the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET)’s trading fees are currently high, increasing the cost burden for securities businesses.
“We believe that they want the SEC to cut trading fees when investors make transactions in stock and futures exchange markets as trading fees are currently high compared to commission fees that have continued to drop, resulting in losses for brokerage firms even though the trading volume is likely to rise,” Ruenvadee said.
“If we cut trading fees, it would alleviate the burden for brokerage firms and boost their performance, while it would encourage them to provide knowledge to investors.”
She added that high trading fees could also be due to brokerage firms having to pay fees to both the SEC and SET.
Meanwhile, Somchai Kanjanapetcharat, KGI Securities (Thailand)’s senior managing director of retail equity business, said the SEC would change trading fee collection in the Thailand Futures Exchange market to monthly payment, while earlier the SEC collected fees when investors made transactions. He added that trading fees from transactions in the stock market would be collected when investors made transactions as before.
“We believe that the SEC move would increase the cost for brokerage firms because the firms would increase commission fees to be in line with the rise in trading fees,” he said.
“If possible, we would like the SEC to cut trading fees because brokerage firms are currently bearing a lot of expenses.”
By The Washington Post · Jeanne Whalen · NATIONAL, BUSINESS, WORLD, TECHNOLOGY, POLITICS, ASIA-PACIFIC WASHINGTON – The Trump administration is considering adding China’s largest semiconductor manufacturer to a trade blacklist, in another sign of heightening U.S.-China technology tensions.
The Defense Department said it is working with other agencies to determine whether the “actions” of Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation, or SMIC, warrant adding the company to the so-called Entity List, which would block U.S. companies from selling SMIC technology without a license.
“Such an action would ensure that all exports to SMIC would undergo a more comprehensive review,” Pentagon spokeswoman Sue Gough said by email Saturday, confirming an earlier report by Reuters.
Gough declined to comment on the reasons for the review. The Pentagon in the past has warned that China’s efforts to develop corporate strength in technologies including semiconductors would be likely to benefit the People’s Liberation Army.
A report last month by SOS International, a defense contractor in Reston, Va., said that SMIC has a variety of ties to China’s defense sector, including an ongoing relationship with CETC, a state-owned developer of military electronics. SMIC has helped CETC test new manufacturing technologies, and has used CETC technologies in its own manufacturing, according to the report, details of which were earlier reported by The Wall Street Journal. SOS also said Chinese military researchers have disclosed in research papers using SMIC technology to manufacture chips.
SMIC officials didn’t respond immediately to a request for comment.
The Entity List, overseen by the Commerce Department, has become a favorite Trump administration tool to crack down on China and now includes more than 300 Chinese entities.
The Trump administration has previously used it against Chinese telecom company Huawei, against entities engaged in alleged human rights violations in China’s Xinjiang region, and most recently against Chinese companies allegedly involved in building controversial islands in the South China Sea.
Founded in 2000 in Shanghai, SMIC ranks among the top five semiconductor manufacturers in the world, according to a report from the United States International Trade Commission, or USITC.
Industry experts say SMIC’s technology lags behind that of chip manufacturers in Taiwan and the United States, but Beijing is pouring billions into the industry to help SMIC and other Chinese companies catch up.
SMIC has enjoyed generous government financial support, including low-interest loans, tax breaks and investments to help build manufacturing facilities, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris said in a report last year.
Western industry experts say that China’s semiconductor companies, while growing, are still reliant on some U.S. technology, including software and manufacturing equipment needed to make chips.
SMIC started as a private company, but state ownership has steadily grown over time, to more than 45% of SMIC stock as of 2018, according to the OECD report.
SMIC’s shares used to trade on the New York Stock Exchange, but the company removed its stock from the NYSE last year. The shares now trade on the Shanghai and Hong Kong exchanges.
In 2018, the U.S. added a different Chinese chip maker, Fujian Jinhua Integrated Circuit Company, to the Entity List, saying it posed a “significant risk of becoming involved in activities that are contrary to the national security interests of the United States.”
Around the same time, the U.S. accused state-owned Fujian Jinhua of stealing commercial secrets from U.S. semiconductor company Micron.
A federal indictment alleged that Fujian Jinhua was part of a conspiracy to use Micron employees in Taiwan to steal sensitive data related to the design and production of so-called DRAM chips, which are used by the defense industry. The Chinese company denied the allegations.
In blacklisting the company, the Commerce Department said Fujian Jinhua’s plans to manufacture DRAM chips threatened “the long term economic viability of U.S. suppliers of these essential components of U.S. military systems.”
Boris Johnson. MUST CREDIT: Bloomberg photo by Simon Dawson 
In a Chicago suburb, e-commerce retailer Jim Tuchler is trying to beat competitors by boosting starting pay to $14.25 an hour from $12, plus offering bonus pay for sticking around. CREDIT: Bloomberg photo by Olivia Obineme 
Yang Xin, minister counsellor and deputy chief of mission at the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China to Thailand 
