The Hong Kong Crisis

[Tamas]

Meanwhile our President sides with Beijing and against the American flag-waving protestors.  Disgusting.

We also recently had a nice minor spate of western corporations taking sides on geopolitical issues in the name of sales.  Always a bad sign.

https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/coach-givenchy-versace-t-shirt-controversy/index.html

I am more concerned that they mark London as simply being England.

I mean, what's in the rest of England that foreigners can't find anywhere else?

[Zoupa]

Boycott Mulan in progress. Disney is not going to like this.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/08/16/asia/china-mulan-actor-protests-intl-hnk-trnd/index.html

[Valmy]

I wish people would boycott them because they are shitty.

[garbon]

Original Mulan was great. Mulan without songs? No, thanks.

[viper37]

Original Mulan was great. Mulan without songs? No, thanks.

the new Aladin had songs and it was shitty.
the new Lion King did not have so many songs as the first one and was okayish.
If there's a new Mulan out there without songs, vitrified HK or no vitrified HK, I'm going!

(sorry, that was my 'Mono' moment )

[Solmyr]

the new Aladin had songs and it was shitty.
the new Lion King did not have so many songs as the first one and was okayish.

You got those backwards.

[Syt]

How shitty can Lion King be? It's Disney's highest grossing movie outside of the Marvel and Star Wars franchises.

[Josquius]

Original Mulan was great. Mulan without songs? No, thanks.

So they fixed it.

[Valmy]

How shitty can Lion King be? It's Disney's highest grossing movie outside of the Marvel and Star Wars franchises.

This is the corporate equivalent of keeping the alcoholic you know supplied with booze. 

Ah well.

[viper37]

How shitty can Lion King be?

they keep singing.

[garbon]

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/04/hong-kong-on-brink-of-recession-as-protests-and-trade-war-take-toll

Hong Kong on brink of recession as protests and trade war take toll

Business activity shows sharpest drop since global financial crisis amid increasingly bleak outlook for territory

Hong Kong is on the verge of a recession as its private sector activity plunged to a decade-low in August amid an escalating trade war and its worst political crisis in decades.

The business survey, released on Wednesday, noted "the steepest deterioration in the health of the private sector since February 2009", adding that spreading pessimism had seen business confidence slump to its lowest on record.

Since early June, Hong Kong has been embroiled in its worst political crisis in decades. The waves of protests, sparked by the controversial extradition bill under which individuals can be sent to mainland China for trial, have entered their 13th week. Over the past three months, the protests have become a broader and increasingly violent anti-government movement as the animosity between demonstrators and police reaches boiling point.

Beijing sees the increasingly violent demonstrations as a direct challenge to its rule over Hong Kong and has accused "foreign hostile forces", particularly the United States and Britain, of fomenting unrest.

The survey, the IHS Markit Hong Kong purchasing managers' index (PMI), sank to 40.8 in August from 43.8 in the previous month. Any figure below 50 indicates contraction.

According to the survey, new business fell to its lowest rate in a decade, as orders from China declined at a record rate. Nearly half of survey respondents reported reduced Chinese demand, citing the ongoing US-China trade dispute, a sharp depreciation in the renminbi and large-scale protests as reasons.

...

[Eddie Teach]

Don't forget the strike that nobody is participating in.

[garbon]

https://www.theguardian.com/business/live/2019/sep/11/sovereign-bond-yields-trade-war-brexit-annuities-ecb-business-live?page=with:block-5d78b52e8f083106f45595aa#block-5d78b52e8f083106f45595aa

NEWSFLASH: Hong Kong's stock exchange has launched an audacious attempt to merge with the London Stock Exchange.

Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited is proposing to pay £29.6bn in cash and shares for the LSE.

It says that the merger would strengthen both businesses, and help them to offer new trading services across the globe.

It could help London pitch services to Chinese customer, and also "reinforce" Hong Kong's position as the gateway to mainland China (which has been threatened by recent protest, of course).

The offer comes just five weeks after the LSE announced its own deal - a surprise merger with data group Refinitiv (part of Thomson Reuters).

HKEX is now trying to crash the party -- saying its proposal (which isn't a full-blown takeover bid yet), is dependent on the Refinitiv deal collapsing or being rejected.

[Josquius]

The protestors have found a valuable new ally.

[mongers]

HK on the brink of a final showdown? 

Activists are closing major roads and other infrastructure, building barricades and preparing for police attempts to take control of universities.