Pres. Xi Meets With US Business Leaders

Improve the News Foundation -

Facts

  • Chinese Pres. Xi Jinping met with roughly 20 American business leaders in Beijing on Wednesday, as China looks to boost economic growth by promoting foreign direct investment. Investment shrank 8% in 2023 due to multiple concerns over tensions between Beijing and Washington.1
  • The meeting was described as a follow-up to Xi’s November dinner with US executives that followed his meeting with US Pres. Joe Biden. The executives were already in Beijing for the state-organized China Development Forum, which took place on Sunday and Monday.2
  • The world’s second-largest economy has struggled to fully recover from the COVID pandemic, and deteriorating relations with the US have exacerbated issues. Xi stressed the mutually beneficial economic ties between the two countries, despite US tariffs and geopolitical tensions.3
  • Xi sought to quell the concerns of US businesses who fear that strict espionage and state secret laws make China hostile towards foreign firms. He also used the opportunity to highlight the PRC's economic growth and improving relations with the US.4
  • Organized by the National Committee on US-China Relations, the US-China Business Council, and the Asia Society, the meeting lasted 90 minutes. The US-China Business Council 'stressed the importance of rebalancing China’s economy' in addition to other concerns.5
  • High-ranking leaders from Blackstone, Qualcomm, Bloomberg, and FedEx attended the meeting, which comes a week after Beijing announced rules that eliminate government oversight of foreign information sharing that isn’t categorized as 'important data.'2

Sources: 1CNA, 2CNBC, 3Associated Press, 4Al Jazeera and 5VOA.

Narratives

  • Pro-China narrative, as provided by MFA. Pres. Xi’s meeting with American business leaders on Monday was a great success and a positive development for strengthened relations between the world's two largest economies. Political differences between two great nations will always exist, but they cannot be allowed to derail mutually beneficial relations that impact the entire world. Pres. Xi is attentive and receptive to the concerns of foreign governmental and business leaders, and Beijing is willing to cooperate to foster a stronger global economy.
  • Anti-China narrative, as provided by The Heritage Foundation. Xi Jinping and the Chinese Communist Party are desperate to revive the PRC's struggling economy, as they recognize that their totalitarian policies have caused the current predicament. In order to reach its goal of 5% gross domestic product growth in 2024, China will need to increase foreign investment, which fell drastically last year. This won't be easy with many governments and businesses hesitant to deal in a country that has become a global antagonist with an unrestrained ruling party. Xi will try to ease global concerns, but he has already done too much damage to China's economy.

Predictions