China on Wednesday said that it has made concessions in proposing to let US regulators audit some of its most sensitive companies and is calling for direct talks to solve a years-long dispute.
In an interview in Beijing, Chinese Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) Vice Chairman Fang Xinghai (方星海) said that China is “sincere” in wanting to solve the standoff over the accounting issues.
US officials have recently stepped up a push to gain access to audit working papers for Chinese companies that trade in the US, threatening rules that would trigger delisting shares such as those of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴) and Baidu Inc (百度) if the request is not met.
The standoff has dogged relations for years and deteriorated since 2017 after a trial inspections done jointly by Chinese and US regulators failed to yield an agreement.
Fang said that earlier this month, the commission sent the US Public Company Accounting Oversight Board a fresh proposal, which would allow the US to pick any of its state-owned enterprises for another trial run.
China would still insist on redacting some information because of national security concerns, a condition Fang described as an international norm.
“As both sides gain confidence, we can proceed to handling these sensitive issues so that both sides are satisfied,” he said. “They are a bit more urgent. We are very sincere, but on the other hand we are also serious about protecting national security information.”
China’s securities regulator in April proposed that joint inspections begin with private-sector companies before moving onto state-owned entities, which are more likely to involve security concerns, Fang said.
Although some materials for private-sector firms could also be redacted because companies such as Alibaba and Baidu have contracts with the government and other “sensitive agencies,” he said.
However, the US oversight board wanted to begin with state-owned entities, which China has agreed to in its latest proposal.
Fang said he has reached out to the US to hold a video or telephone meeting, but has yet to get a response.
As to why another pilot auditing project has not taken place since 2017, Fang said that it could be due to the “general atmosphere.”
When Fang went to the US in September last year to try to solve this issue, the chairman of the oversight board refused to meet him and instead sent one of his department heads, said a person familiar with the matter, who declined to be named discussing a private matter.
In the past, oversight board chairs had been happy to meet and talk, the person said.
“For more than a decade we have sought to establish a cooperative relationship with China that is consistent with others around the world,” board Chairman William Duhnke said in a statement on Wednesday.
“Such a relationship, however, cannot be meaningfully pursued without the Chinese first embracing our core access principles. Despite the CSRC’s recent claims, its proposals remain materially deficient,” Duhnke said.
TECH PARTNERSHIP: The deal with Arizona-based Amkor would provide TSMC with advanced packing and test capacities, a requirement to serve US customers Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is collaborating with Amkor Technology Inc to provide local advanced packaging and test capacities in Arizona to address customer requirements for geographical flexibility in chip manufacturing. As part of the agreement, TSMC, the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, would contract turnkey advanced packaging and test services from Amkor at their planned facility in Peoria, Arizona, a joint statement released yesterday said. TSMC would leverage these services to support its customers, particularly those using TSMC’s advanced wafer fabrication facilities in Phoenix, Arizona, it said. The companies would jointly define the specific packaging technologies, such as TSMC’s Integrated
An Indian factory producing iPhone components resumed work yesterday after a fire that halted production — the third blaze to disrupt Apple Inc’s local supply chain since the start of last year. Local industrial behemoth Tata Group’s plant in Tamil Nadu, which was shut down by the unexplained fire on Saturday, is a key linchpin of Apple’s nascent supply chain in the country. A spokesperson for subsidiary Tata Electronics Pvt yesterday said that the company would restart work in “many areas of the facility today.” “We’ve been working diligently since Saturday to support our team and to identify the cause of the fire,”
China’s economic planning agency yesterday outlined details of measures aimed at boosting the economy, but refrained from major spending initiatives. The piecemeal nature of the plans announced yesterday appeared to disappoint investors who were hoping for bolder moves, and the Shanghai Composite Index gave up a 10 percent initial gain as markets reopened after a weeklong holiday to end 4.59 percent higher, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index dived 9.41 percent. Chinese National Development and Reform Commission Chairman Zheng Shanjie (鄭珊潔) said the government would frontload 100 billion yuan (US$14.2 billion) in spending from the government’s budget for next year in addition
Sales RecORD: Hon Hai’s consolidated sales rose by about 20 percent last quarter, while Largan, another Apple supplier, saw quarterly sales increase by 17 percent IPhone assembler Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) on Saturday reported its highest-ever quarterly sales for the third quarter on the back of solid global demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團) globally, said it posted NT$1.85 trillion (US$57.93 billion) in consolidated sales in the July-to-September quarter, up 19.46 percent from the previous quarter and up 20.15 percent from a year earlier. The figure beat the previous third-quarter high of NT$1.74 trillion recorded in 2022, company data showed. Due to rising demand for AI, Hon Hai said its cloud and networking division enjoyed strong sales
RSS