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Home » Transcript of Decoding China’s Economy: Present and Future at WEF Annual Meeting 2025

Transcript of Decoding China’s Economy: Present and Future at WEF Annual Meeting 2025

Read the full transcript of a panel discussion titled “Decoding China’s Economy: Present and Future” at World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2025, [Feb 21, 2025]. Speakers include: Michael Süss, Bonnie Y Chan, Zhu Min, Hou Qijun, and Tian Wei is the moderator of this session.

Listen to the audio version here:

TRANSCRIPT:

Introduction

TIAN WEI: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for being the early birds, fighting the morning traffic and being here on time. Thank you so much. We are really impressed. With that strength and energy, the economy is no problem.

Good morning. My name is Tian Wei. What a pleasure to see you here in Davos at the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum. It’s such a pleasure. And we all know the topic today has been at the headline and in everybody’s heart for a long time.

What is going on with the Chinese economy? Well, in exact terms, “Decoding Chinese Economy: Present and Future.” This session is a joint session between the World Economic Forum and CGTN from China. As we know, over the past few months, one after another, stimulus policies or related measures have been made public from China. We see some impacts already, but many are expecting more to happen in the coming year, especially during China’s annual parliamentary season.

However, what do stimulus policies mean? And how will they work with the growth potential, especially in the transformation of the Chinese economy? That is the question to be asked. Meanwhile, are the Chinese consumers really spending? I’m sure everybody is asking that question.

Panel Introduction

Well, I’m no expert on either of these questions, but I’m so happy here to be joined by such a strong panel representing very different sectors who can bring us from the ground some really fresh information and insights. So it’s my great honor to introduce our panelists. I will start from the order of sequence given by the organizer.

Lady first, of course, Bonnie Chan, Chief Executive Officer of the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing from Hong Kong SAR. Bonnie, good to see you.

BONNIE Y CHAN: Thank you so much. Morning.

TIAN WEI: Hou Qijun, President of China National Petroleum Corporation, otherwise known as CNPC. Good morning, Mr. Hou. Thanks very much for being here.

I’m joined by someone who everybody knows here at the World Economic Forum, Mr. Zhu Min, member of the Senior Expert Advisory Committee from the China Center for International Economic Exchanges from China. Meanwhile, he also served as a member of the Board of Trustees for the World Economic Forum. Mr. Zhu, good to see you, Dr. Zhu.

Last but certainly not least, the gentleman sitting on my immediate left, Michael Süss, Executive Chairman of Oerlikon Switzerland. This gentleman has been working with China for more than twenty-five to twenty-six years, I just learned this morning. Good to see you.

China’s Economy and Trump 2.0

I remember Professor Schwab at the very opening of the forum this year said we all need to have a spirit of something called constructive optimism. Did I remember that right? Constructive optimism. With that in mind, let’s share that the number of China’s GDP reached its target around five percent. That’s the latest news. But even with that number, many are thinking… Dr. Zhu, since you are a great friend, I’ll tap on you first. Is China ready for both the opportunities and the challenges of Trump 2.0, the Chinese economy?

ZHU MIN: Wow. That’s a wake-up question. Is everybody awake? I mean, number one, Trump is unpredictable, right? Prediction is almost impossible. But it’s morning, so I’m still in half of my sleep, so I can say something I cannot remember maybe later.

I think number one, Trump is unpredictable. But Chinese say, you not only listen to what the people say, you watch what they do. So this is very important. He says so many things, but we’ll see what he will do. Yesterday, he announced he will impose ten percent tariff on China sometime next month, so we don’t know.

But the second point is also important. I think there’s a huge room for these two countries to work together and create a huge benefit for both countries. It’s much, much bigger than two countries who fight each other, having a winner or loser. We even don’t know who will win, who will lose. China still has a $320 billion trade surplus with US. This is a lot of room to work with. Chinese companies would love to invest in U.S. Now we are doing the reverse technology transfer like EV, batteries, all those other things. Fentanyl is another issue, right? There’s a lot of concerns.

So there are a lot of things that both countries can work together on. I do hope—I do believe the two countries will and can work together to find a mutual way. It’s good for both and good for the whole world. Chinese economy is already… Yeah.

But you never know, right? So third point, we’re looking for 2.0. We have to go back to what is 2.0 or what is Trump 1.0’s impact on Chinese economy. Trump’s 1.0 created three direct impacts.

The first is on trade. The US tariff before Trump launched 301 against China was 3.75%. So this is in line with the most favorable nation tariff. At the end of last year, it’s 19.7%. So the tariff actually in seven years increased 15%. So this is really a big impact. But China keeps exports roughly $450 billion to $500 billion US dollars to the US. China keeps roughly $350 billion trade surplus with US. So China really maintained its competitiveness. I think that’s important.

But still, on another side, China doesn’t have trade growth because all the growth is moving to other Asian countries and Mexico and others. So Chinese market in the U.S. import share shrank from 21% to 15% now. So it does have impact on trade. I think that’s one thing.

The second issue is the impact on the equity market.