TSMC - would Morris Zhang change his mind

 

Is there still time for Zhang Zhongmou to change his mind and work with China, work with SMIC and challenge the American hegemony on chips? Or he has surrendered everything to the Americans, too late already?

When TSMC is uprooted, many supporting industries would go belly up unless they are needed and also uprooted to the US. There will be a vaccuum of sort in Taiwan, factories and land would be emptied. Many Taiwanese would be jobless.

The economy would be affected and the GDP would fall.

Temporary it looks like the Americans are the main winner. However, when the decoupling takes full effect, all the American based chip makers would only be selling to the American and European markets. The Chinese market would be closed to them. China would speed up in becoming self sufficient in chip making.

The American chip making industry would face a glut of chips with no one to sell to. China is the biggest consumer of chips, but would be no more.

In this chip war, it would be a clean divide and no more cross trading. All the American chip based manufacturers would have to downsize, cut jobs, cut capacities. What is the point of producing chips with no buyers, like Australian iron ore, wines, seafood, lobsters, without China absorbing the bulk of them, they could only sell retail.

Pity the chip manufacturers, the workers, and the farmers and fishermen in Australia. This is penny wise pound foolish. Like the stupid Europeans, heavily dependent on the Russians for cheap oil and gas and food and want to play punk with their main source of cheap supplies. Now feeling the pain.

The Americans would feel the pain very soon. TSMC would not need the capacity and the jobs. After a year or two, TSMC would have to retrench the workers and engineers they are recruiting now.

Someone said the American and European leaders are smart. Really? Fighting with the hands that feed them?

 

 Anonymous

 

Taiwan - Should it go the Ukraine way?

On December 25, the PLA Eastern Theater Command has held cross-service joint alert patrol and fire strike drills around the Taiwan island. According to statistics from the Taiwan military, in the 24 hours from 6:00 am on December 25 to 6:00 am on December 26, a total of 71 PLA military aircraft and seven PLA warships were operating around the Taiwan Straits, of which 47 aircraft flew over the "middle line" of the Taiwan Straits and entered the "airspace" to the southwest of the Taiwan island.  RT

The more the separatist DPP try to break away from China, the more the Americans would encourage them to do so, the stronger China will response. The more aggressive the separatists push for independence, the earlier China would decide on a forceful reunification. China cannot and would not allow Taiwan to break away from the mainland. No Chinese leader would allow that, and especially now when militarily China is able to reunite by force, and able to ward off any intervention by the Americans or the Japanese. The rice is as good as cooked. There is no turning back the clock. The reunification with the motherland is a matter of now or tomorrow.

With the developments in Ukraine, the Taiwanese are getting a preview of what would happen to them when China decides to do a forceful reunification. The Taiwanese can count on the number of Taiwanese and capital fleeing the island. The Taiwanese can count on how many cities would be destroyed. The Taiwanese can count on how many Taiwanese would die. The Taiwanese can count on how many days they would last before the PLA takes over the island. People from both sides of the Straits would be winners.

The Taiwanese cannot count on the Americans coming to their aid with aircraft carriers task force. China would make sure they would be sunk. Similarly, the Taiwanese cannot count on the Japanese to come to their aid. They would also be sunk. Forget about air bridge to supply food and weapons. No aircraft could come near or enter the airspace over Taiwan.

These are the stark realities facing Taiwan. The alternative is not bondage or oppression. The alternative is a big welcome party, to celebrate the reunification of China and participate in the growth and prosperity of China.

What would the Taiwanese choose? Should the Taiwanese be encouraged to fight to the last Taiwanese like the Ukrainians? Are the Taiwanese willing to bear the loss of lives and properties and a good life? Or would the Taiwanese choose to fight a war that they cannot win but guaranteed for destruction?

Peaceful reunification is not colonisation or conquest and subjugation, to lose everything, but everything to gain.  Reunification is like reuniting with brothers and sisters and to continue on a glorious journey to become the proud people of a super power, China. Families would be united, friends and comrades would rejoice together as one people. The economy and businesses in Taiwan would boom. The Taiwanese people can only become richer and life can only be better. China can only be more generous in its policies towards Taiwan.

Would the Taiwanese choose to live gloriously as part of the great Chinese Civilisation, or to end in tragedy, like the Ukrainians?

Daxing International Airport - Building a new China

 

Beijing Daxing International Airport Photo: Xinhua

China's Daxing Airport, a fine example of what's more to come from China as it leapfrogged over ageing America and Europe. For decades, America and Europe were the modern cities and skyscrapers of the world. Today modern cities, super highways and super infrastructures are in Chinese cities. The rejuvenation and transformation of an ancient civilisation is taking place in breaknecking speed.

Some parts of old China would be preserved, like the Forbidden City of the Emperors, and selected towns or districts. But a new and futuristic China is emerging from the ashes of antiquity. China not only has the resources and funds, but also the expertise to do the necessary to improve the lives of its people. 5G is standard in all Chinese cities. Very affdordable high speed trains are everywhere.

You want to see the future, go to China. EV cars, driveless cars, IOTs, cashless transactions, trains travelling at the speed of airplanes, etc etc are common features of the Chinese landscape as the population embrace a new tomorrow. China is the shining light of the East.

White vultures' market manipulation SOP

"When poor countries go through an economic shock, the vultures of Wall Street descend upon them and destroy their currencies and bonds. "

And their stock markets also.

How did the American banks operate?

When they want to target a particular Asian country, first the US bank borrow say USD 2 billon worth of that Asian country's currency. Then they sell USD 1 billion worth of that Asian currency, causing the currency to collapse in thin (ie no liquidity) forex markets.

At the same time, they short-sell the Asian country's stocks, causing the stock market to tumble.

The Asian central bank, wanting to punish short-sellers of the Asian currency, then raise sharply their local interest rates to make borrowing costs very high for FX short-sellers, which also exacerbate the fall in local stock prices. That's when the Asian central bank fell into the US banks' trap. Because the US bank still have on hand USD 1 billion worth of the Asian currency (remember, they borrowed USD 2 billion worth and shorted just USD 1 billion worth of the Asian currency).

With the remaining USD 1 billion worth of Asian currency, they lent these out at very high interest rates, thanks to the central bank's rate hike.

After the Asian currency and stocks plunged enough, the US banks covered their short Asian currency and equities positions.

From their vicious operation, the US banks made very huge profits in their short-currency, short-equities and high-interest lending - all out of thin air !

So China is wise not to lift all its yuan forex capital controls.



- me, ex-interbank FX market maker

Independence Day 2.0 - True Independence a work in progress

 500 years of bullying, exploitation and killings by the white men is coming to an end, but may take a bit longer.

In the years immediately after WW2, countries of the world were crying and fighting for their independence from white men's colonial rule and imperialism. It was a cry for freedom from colonialism and western imperialism.

They got independence but not real freedom. The white men continue to rule the coloured people by a new kind of colonialism, ruling their minds, their thinking, with the media, and military might. They spread the narrative that the white men were superior to them, their saviours. Just like four legs were good, two legs better. It was coloured people were good, white men were better. 

The coloured people were drugged by this narrative and were manipulated to hate and fight against each other with the white men standing outside the ring yelling at them to keep fighting and keep killing each other, and selling them plenty of the best weapons of course. You are under threat from this and that, you need to buy more weapons. The coloured people make enemies of each other, did not trust each other, while the white men sowed distrust and create enmities among the coloured people.

The coloured people's mind is still enslaved by the white men. Look at how the coloured people fear and hate China, North Korea, Iran, Russia etc etc countries that did them no harm, instead they are still madly in love the white men, the warmongers and terrorists that invaded many countries, starting wars everywhere, sanctioning and bullying countries, threatening countries and killing coloured people.

Now there is another call for freedom and independence of the mind and thinking. The coloured people must start to think and see who are the real devils and evil men that is threatening them and world peace. Who are the real enemies of the coloured people?

This is the second revolution, to be really free from the mental control by the white men, to think independently, clearly and to decide on what is good for them, in their own interests, to chart their own future, not be controlled and blinded by the white men. Not to accept American dominance as a normal state of affair. The enslavement of the minds of the coloured people by the daily bombarbment of western media that white men are good, white men's lies are the truth, white men's fake democracy and fake ideas of human rights are the values to live by, and subconsciously to continue to be enslaved by white men's superiority and hegemony,... must be brought to an end.

For peace and prosperity and a better life for the coloured people of the world, the myth of white men's supremacy, white men's fake values that is all about the control of the coloured people through wars and conflicts and military might, must be destroyed. This is the second awakening, the second fight for freedom, for real independence from the white men. The physical independence of taking control of one's own land is only partial independence. Total independence is freedom, is when the mind is set free, free from the control of white men's media and their narratives. 

A very good example of mental colonisation is the people of Hong Kong. They are still colonised by Britain inside their heads and unable to break free, to be truly independent in their thoughts. The HongKongers are madly in love with British colonial rule and dying to have the British back to rule them. But knowing that the British cannot be back, they are willing to give up their citizenship and fly to Britain to be ruled by the British all over again. 

In a way, Singapore is not far behind Hong Kong. Look at the bananas, what they said, what they liked, how they adored the Queen. These are the signs that they are still colonial subjects of the British Empire. Some Asean states are also not fully independent from their colonial masters. A bit of the Stockholm Syndrome is at play in their mindset. They still feel attached to their colonial masters, and white men's fakery and lies are their moral compass of goodness and being civilised...forgetting the massacres and cruelties committed by the colonial masters.

A second example is the British Commonwealth. Why would colonised nations, now independent, still want to be a member of this colonial vestige to remind them that they were once colonies, not citizens, and to respect the King/Queen of England as their head? Don't they feel ashame to be still a part of the evil colonial heritage? Should not they bury this shameful and demeaning organisation for good? Or they are still having fond memories of their colonisation and want to keep this memories alive, the good old days and feel very good about it? Colonisation was only a good thing in the history books written by the colonial masters, a good thing for them, not the colonised people? To the colonial powers, it was never a crime to conquer, rule and plunder a country of its wealth and make its people semi slaves of the empire with no human rights, just sub humans.

A third example is when Washington called, everyone would obediently, without a second thought, without asking why, packed and flew to Washington with a big entourage of cabinet ministers. For what they did not know, could they say no and not attend? No. This is a sign of the lack of freedom, still colonised inside the heads. Go, they must... when the master summoned. What went through the heads of the Americans when the African leaders formed a beeline like sheep to greet the Emperor?

Free and independent nations do not take orders from Washington meekly. Free and independent nations are free to decide if they wish or do not wish to go to Washington. When they are not independent, not going is not an option. The subconscious told them to go, it is like second nature. None have doubts about their independence. None question their independence or freedom to choose, to say no. It did not occur in their minds that they need not have to go. The Americans are not their colonial masters or overlord.

True freedom and independence would come when they can see through the lies and fakeness of the white men, able to see the white men as what they really are, another human bean like them, and believe in themselves that they are the equals of the white men, no more unthinking believers of the Pinkerton Syndrome.

True freedom is when your mind is set free. When Nelson Mandela was imprisoned in his cell, he was still a free man. His mind was free. They could lock him up physically, but cannot lock his soul and his mind. There is still some way to go for the ex colonies to be truly freed from being colonised people.

Oh, the white men, under the American Empire, is still in control of the world. They can bully the rest of the world with sanctions, regime change and threats of war if any country would dare to go against their interest. They dictate to the world, with their own rules based order, their rules, their orders, not international rules under the UN.