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Dutch government takes control of Chinese-owned chipmaker Nexperia

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Re: Dutch government takes control of Chinese-owned chipmaker Nexperia

#541

Post by xpe »

mk89 wrote: post #354
bgnn wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't you say the same for the West though? This news is about a Chinese company's control being taking over by a Western government.

In no way this is comparable, come on. When you run your business in China, China runs the copy of your business for you ;) I do understand that we want to try to see "the same" in the stupidity of our politicians that let all of this happen just like that for many years, but we are different.

I can see what both of the above commenters are saying. Here is my synthesis:

In the US, the powers-that-be are often content to let markets, popular forces, and regulation shape foreign companies. In China (I'm no expert, please weigh in [1]) it seems that the CCP is very motivated to make foreign firms serve its industrial agenda while staying under Party control. That usually means insisting on Chinese ownership stakes or joint‑venture structures, so the state always has a foothold in the business.

In this way, politicians of both countries do find ways to "get what they want" from a foreign business -- even if they go about doing it differently.

[1] I'm not ignorant of geopolitics; I do read about China, but focusing on it is not part of my job nor education.

Re: Dutch government takes control of Chinese-owned chipmaker Nexperia

#542

Post by vladms »

williamdclt wrote: post #434
vladms wrote: post #429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some will win and some will loose without free trade as well. Or do you think without free trade everybody will be great? For me consumerism seems much worse than free trade. Buying clothes and use it once, change the car each year or other similar behaviors seem unsustainable because nobody cares about the generated garbage or the energy/material requirements. Sure, now in some countries we can associate free trade…

> For me consumerism seems much worse than free trade. Buying clothes and use it once, change the car each year or other similar behaviors seem unsustainable because nobody cares about the generated garbage or the energy/material requirements. I don't believe in putting the responsibility on individuals. Billions upon billions of whatever currency are being poured into ads, marketing, influencing, lobbying, propagand…

Not sure what you are arguing for, if it is that something should be done about consumerism/externalities, I definitely agree. People are not "act against free trade en masse" either, it is a policy choice with various impacts, which I doubt will be "great" for most, just different.

> "making more money" is the only incentive this society has in place

Which society? I lived in 3 different societies (more than a couple of years), and while it is true that money is one of the incentive I think there were fundamental differences that were not obvious about what makes people tick. And by looking at the political situation around the globe - my impression that people care about many more things than their bank account.

That does not mean I propose specific solutions, I am just very skeptical that without free trade things will be better on average for more people than without, if anything is just a red herring so that nobody deals with the more complex issues.

Re: Dutch government takes control of Chinese-owned chipmaker Nexperia

#543

Post by DiogenesKynikos »

andsoitis wrote: post #524
lossolo wrote: post #519

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The “Negative List for Foreign Investment” explicitly bans or limits foreign participation in many areas (e.g., media, education, data services, telecoms, mining) That's a very good for them, by looking at the list. Look at how big a problem the EU now has with its reliance on US tech and military. Sovereignty is very important in strategic industries and in those that allow foreign powers to influence your populat…

> Volkswagen is a cherry picked example, look at Tesla, which isn't a joint venture. BMW still uses a JV but now holds 75% of BMW Brilliance etc. No cherry picking. Purely random. FWIW, according to my quick research there are only 3 vehicle manufacturers that operate and manufacture in China while retaining 100% ownership as a foreign company. They are Tesla (Gigafactory in Shanghai), Lexus (EV plant in Shanghai), a…

Toyota is taking over a 100% stake in its China operations.

Re: Dutch government takes control of Chinese-owned chipmaker Nexperia

#544

Post by notmyjob »

paganel wrote: post #523
touristtam wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Erm - there is such thing as the concept of strategical industries. And it is neither a European thing or a modern thing either, but don't let that stop you from spouting a narrative where Europe is the bad guy in an international landscape where they have transferred voluntarily or not such much technology to China.

Almost everything can be seen as strategic.

That’s a rather weak retort. Certain things like uranium and pharmaceuticals are pretty obviously strategic while other things like dog food are not.

Re: Dutch government takes control of Chinese-owned chipmaker Nexperia

#546

Post by hermitcrab »

Jensson wrote: post #267
hermitcrab wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I understand it, the Roman Empire was fuelled by expansion (stealing other people stuff), enabled by their exceptional military machine. Once they could not profitably expand any further, they were in trouble.

It lasted for many centuries after they ran out of stuff to conquer, so no.

The Roman Empire reached its maximum extent under Trajan around 117CE.

The decline began around 180CE to 235CE, depending on where you draw the line. That isn't 'many centuries' in my book.

Re: Dutch government takes control of Chinese-owned chipmaker Nexperia

#547

Post by corimaith »

RobotToaster wrote: post #485
meekaaku wrote: post #410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reducing/eliminating those mandatory joint ventures were a requirement for China to join WTO. But in practice it delayed these reforms.

Then someone should take the case to the WTO Appellate Body(0), unfortunately Trump and Biden have blocked appointments to it since 2019, so WTO rules cannot be enforced. (0) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appellate_Body

There are a million ways to cheat trade, the WTO was created to handle small disputes, not large structural imbalances. International Law was highly flawed in that regard owing back to Bretton Woods.

But of course it benefits everyone at the expense of deficit countries, so why change or truly address the literature. Appealing to international law today as such is just appealing to entrenched interests.

But the matter of fact is that in a true free trade regime, imbalances should rebalance back to zero. The fact that the deficit is only growing is more than enough evidence that China is obviously the violators here. And everybody knows this.

Under a multilateral Bancor System which Chinese economists themselves advocated back in 2009, China would have been immediately subjected to massive FX overvaluation to degrade their conpetiveness.

Re: Dutch government takes control of Chinese-owned chipmaker Nexperia

#549

Post by corimaith »

bigbadfeline wrote: post #265
corimaith wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>As soon as China tries to compete with the rich monopolies, the "free market" goes out of the window and becomes "free to do as we tell you". When China cannot compete with incumbents those protections also go up and when they can now people like you appeal to free trade (while ignoring existing protections). You are being overly charitable to one side here. Which is it? Free trade or Protectionism?

> can now people like you appeal to free trade You're assuming too much and, along with others here, acting like you've been hurt. "Free trade" is the mantra of Western economists and politicians since the time of Adam Smith, and it's been a ruse since then too. Read him. > When China cannot compete with incumbents those protections also go up. They do, but not in the erratic manner, levels or timing we're observing…

>Adam Smith, and it's been a ruse since then too. Read him.

You should read Keynes as the primary opposing side to US during Bretton Woods, with strong support from most bankers at the time. The WTO has no answer to structural imbalances nor was ever intended to resolve such a matter.

The status quo you support is not grounded in economic literature than it is a incoherent mess that was created through political circumstances. Under a truly multilateral system of the ICU, China would have been severely disciplined years ago for its distortionary surplus actions.

Re: Dutch government takes control of Chinese-owned chipmaker Nexperia

#550

Post by rasz »

aurareturn wrote: post #305
Luker88 wrote: post #61

I don't know if something similar was feared, but I would like to remind people of what happened in 2020 with China and ARM. You don't get into the China market without losing control.

Which came from the US sanctioning Huawei because Huawei was making better chips than Qualcomm and Cisco. US was posturing to ban China access to Arm. Ultimately, it led to a ban on using TSMC for Chinese companies instead. There is no real justification to do a blanket ban on all Chinese companies except a state-sponsored way to to slow China down in AI race.

Not better, just cheaper copies. And all it took was mining Nortel to death and then moving on to mining Cisco itself.
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