The Big Call

China’s box office success

Our survey of cinemagoers, cinema managers, movie executives and investors suggests that the recent boom in Chinese film investment and revenue is set to continue, but also highlights risks to the sector’s outlook.

Consumer China

Online advertising: more mobile, more targeted

Online advertising continues to steal budget from traditional media in China. Within this growing market, we expect strong growth on mobile, while better-targeted formats will steal market share from portal sites.

East Money – e-commerce services drive rapid growth

Rapid growth in financial e-commerce services has driven significant top-line and bottom-line improvements for China’s leading financial information vertical portal.

Autohome – car site remains in the fast lane

Continued strong advertising revenue and a number of recent product launches and partnerships should drive further strong revenue growth for China’s leading car information and listings site.

Weibo – growth faces mounting threats

Despite rapid top-line growth, mounting issues with user acquisition and retention and limited ad inventory diversification present real threats to Weibo’s prospects.

58.com – classified ad leader facing property headwinds

China’s leading online classified advertising site by revenue should continue to outperform in a fast-growing sector, but sluggish property sales are likely to exert a short-term drag on revenue.

Financial China

Further trust slowdown ratchets up the pressure

Trust issuance has continued to slow as the value of maturing trusts are rising dramatically, increasing potential default risks. To date, however, policymakers remain reluctant to countenance infrastructure trust defaults, with defaults most likely to occur within the energy and mining sectors.

Selected financial charts

A selection of key financial data over the past fortnight.

Capital Intensive China

China’s housing shortage persists

Despite the fall in home sales this year, our analysis suggests that China’s housing market is undersupplied rather than oversupplied.

Best of Chinese Commentators

Media reforms on the way

A recent announcement by Chinese president Xi Jinping urging deeper reform of China’s media sector has sparked debate about the likely impact on the top-performing A-share sector last year.

Chinese gold sales: losing their lustre?

A slowdown in gold sales in China in 1H14 has prompted debate about the outlook for gold investment and jewellery sales during the remainder of the year.

Report archive

28 August 2014

Macro View