Humour: News in Cartoon

Chart: China’s Dragon Boat Festiva Holiday Spending Trails Pre-pandemic Levels

China’s domestic travel spending during the three-day holiday fell short of 2019 levels, fueling concerns that momentum is fading in the country’s post-Covid recovery.

While domestic tourism revenue from Thursday to Saturday increased 44.5% from last year’s break to reach 37.3 billion yuan ($5.2 billion), that figure was still 5.1% below 2019 pre-pandemic levels, according to data released by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism. The number of tourism trips reached 106 million, a 32.3% increase from last year and 12.8% above 2019 levels. Sunday was an adjusted working day.

Source : Caixin

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China’s June Car Sales Expected to Decline as Consumption Slows

Linda Lew wrote . . . . . . . . .

China’s June passenger car sales are expected to drop 5.9% in June from the same month last year, when deliveries jumped as Shanghai emerged from a punishing Covid lockdown.

The Passenger Car Association said Sunday that retail sales will total about 1.83 million units, compared with 1.94 million in June 2022. While that’s higher than full-year sales in countries such as the UK and Canada, demand in the world’s biggest automotive market remains far below its pre-pandemic peak despite reopening and the government’s stimulation efforts.

There are signs of growing stability. Sales have risen month-over-month throughout 2023 and are nearing the peak performance seen during the Covid years. Overall, car deliveries grew 4.2% in the first five months of this year compared with 2022.

Price War Squeezes Chinese Carmakers With No Relief in Sight

It’s a modest increase considering that a price war has slashed the cost of some models by up to 40% and the government is offering incentives. Beijing has launched a six-month drive to boost the industry, promoted electric vehicles in rural areas and extended a tax break for clean car purchases until 2027 in recent weeks.

Clean car sales are expected to grow 26% to 670,000 units in June 2023 from a year earlier, a more moderate rise compared with the explosive 130% increase seen in 2022.

Source : BNN Bloomberg

Chart: U.S. Stock Ownership Rebounds, Income Gap Remains

Source : Statista

Yuan Weakens to 7-Month Low Despite China’s Move to Stem Decline

From Bloomberg . . . . . . . . .

The onshore yuan reopened from a holiday on the back foot, despite a move by China to slow its slide with a stronger-than-expected reference rate for the managed currency.

The yuan slid as much as 0.9% to a seven-month low of 7.2380 per dollar in Shanghai on Monday, as pessimism over the economic recovery and China’s policy divergence from peers continued to weigh on sentiment. The offshore yuan declined 0.3%, also falling to the lowest since November. The People’s Bank of China had sought to curb onshore currency weakness by setting its so-called fixing at the largest premium to estimates this year on Monday.

The move suggests the PBOC is growing increasingly uncomfortable with weakness in the yuan, the worst performer in Asia in the past month. Late in the afternoon on Monday, some state-owned Chinese banks were seen selling the greenback against the yuan, triggering a quick rebound in the currency that later faded, according to traders who asked not to be identified.

“It is possible for the yuan to weaken further in the near term as central banks of developed markets are more hawkish than expected and China growth recovery slower than expected, especially with the absence of stronger stimulus,” said Becky Liu, head of China macro strategy at Standard Chartered Plc. in Hong Kong. “The yuan could fall to about 7.3 per dollar, but by the end of third or fourth quarter, we see room for it to stabilize and regain some ground.”

Optimism that authorities would be more proactive in supporting growth after the PBOC lowered a string of policy rates were dashed last week after mainland banks only reduced a key lending benchmark by a moderate amount, a move that sent the yuan and stocks tumbling. The daily fixing limits the onshore yuan’s moves by 2% on either side.

Weakness in mainland stocks continued as trading resumed after holidays, with the CSI 300 Index sliding as much as 1.6%. The onshore yuan’s drop was the largest since February.

State banks’ selling of the dollar against the yuan in the afternoon resulted in a stronger so-called “official close,” which is a key factor the PBOC considers in the next day’s fixing. A few years ago, the central bank was speculated to have intervened in the currency market towards the official close to ensure the reference rate on the following day was strong.

“Any concrete news on a new China round of fiscal stimulus would be helpful, but our sense is that we may still need to wait for the July politburo meeting,” said Rodrigo Catril, currency strategist at National Australia Bank Ltd. in Sydney.

China’s travel spending during the holiday fell short of pre-Covid levels, adding to concerns the post-Covid recovery in the economy is losing steam. Manufacturing data for June, which will be released later this week, are expected to show a continued contraction amid weak demand, according to Bloomberg economists.

There have been limtied signs of direct intervention to prop up the yuan this year. In May, China’s foreign-exchange regulator vowed it would “strengthen the guidance of market expectations and take actions to correct pro-cyclical and one-way market behaviors when necessary.”

But that doesn’t mean the PBOC can’t go back to its playbook of supporting the currency. Last year, the central bank adopted measures such as a string of much stronger-than-expected fixings, cutting the reserve requirement ratio for foreign-currency deposits and increasing the cost for traders looking to short the yuan.

Monday’s currency fixing “could be the first concrete indication from the authorities that they see yuan weakness as being overdone,” said Khoon Goh, head of Asia research at Australia & New Zealand Banking Group.

“With Japanese officials also coming out and warning against excessive yen weakness, it does seem likely that we could see a rebound in the yuan this week, especially given that it is month-end when exporters typically convert their export receipts into yuan,” he said.

Source : Yahoo!

2023 Is the Year of Getting Sick on a Cruise

Annalisa Merelli wrote . . . . . . . . .

The reported occurrence of gastrointestinal diseases on cruises is worse than pre-covid.

Holland America’s Nieuw Amsterdam, a cruise ship that, according to the company’s site, “celebrates historic New York City with an inspired design and art collection,” is currently traveling along the western coast of Canada for a 14-day tour to Alaska and back.

For tickets starting at $2,699 per-person, double occupancy rate, 1,970 passengers get to enjoy a spa treatments, fine meals, and pickleball at sea. For 160 of them, and 26 members of its 813-person staff, the journey also featured a gastrointestinal illness.

They aren’t alone. The Nieuw Amsterdam outbreak is the 11th to occur this year. It’s a sign—if not the most desirable one—that things are back to pre-covid levels: This is the highest number of outbreaks recorded on ships since 2018, and even then it took the whole year to get to 11.

Norovirus and more

As part of its Vessel Sanitation Program (VSP), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) tracks occurrences of gastrointestinal disease on board, which cruises are required to report. The cases are reported before arriving to the US from a foreign port, or whenever 3% or more of cruise passengers or crew are ill.

So far this year, 1,503 people—1,321 passengers, and 182 crew members—have come down with gastrointestinal illnesses on cruises that had the US as part of their itinerary. Most of the infections are still of unknown origin, while in three cases the outbreaks were identified as norovirus, which is a relatively common cause of gastrointestinal disease on cruises. Norovirus survives on surfaces, and it can spread easily on ships where rooms are close, buffets proliferate, and people share confined spaces.

Though it was one of the largest of the year, the outbreak on the Nieuw Amsterdam was mild, and all sick individuals were quarantined. Only on the Princess Cruises’s Ruby Princess, which had a norovirus outbreak during its mid-February trip, were there were more cases, with 234 passengers and 34 members of the crew becoming ill. Data on outbreaks on cruises is available starting from 1994, and the rate of incidence has diminished significantly since it reached a peak in the early 2000s, when outbreaks regularly surpassed 20 per year.

The number of outbreaks might also be a sign that ridership on cruise ships is returning to pre-pandemic levels. In 2019, nearly 15 million people took cruises in the US, while that number was down to only 2 million in 2021, and about 5 million in 2022.

Illness on cruises isn’t as common as it is on land

Gastrointestinal disease of this type isn’t usually serious serious—though it’s hardly fun, especially at sea. But it’s hardly exclusive to cruises: The vast majority of outbreaks happen on land, and every year there are around 2,500 outbreaks of norovirus recorded in the US, causing up to 21 million cases.

As the CDC notes, millions of people travel on cruises every year, making less than a dozen outbreaks a relatively minor concern. “Health officials track illness on cruise ships. So outbreaks are found and reported more quickly on a cruise ship than on land,” says the CDC.

Still, it’s helpful to follow basic health precautions to limit the chance of getting sick, including reporting any illness that occurs prior to joining a voyage, or while on board, frequent and washing hands, and leaving the area if someone is sick.

Source : QUARTZ

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Read also at CDC

Outbreak Updates for International Cruise Ships . . . . .