China Slams Western Financial Firms

China’s $200 billion sovereign wealth fund, China Investment Corp. (CIC), doesn’t plan to open its wallet to foreign financial firms and banks any time soon.

Still mindful of losing about $6 billion of the $8 billion CIC invested in Morgan Stanley (MS) and Blackstone last year, chairman Lou Jiwei not only bluntly rejected the notion of putting the government’s money into banks outside of its homeland, but did so citing an overwhelming fear.

"I don’t dare to invest in financial institutions now," Lou, said today (Wednesday) at a conference in Hong Kong, Bloomberg reported. "The policies of the developed nations…

This is a precursur of things to come

Barrons:

After Mao drove the Nationalists off the Mainland in 1949, the cry went up among U.S. conservatives, "Who lost China?"
Now Washington might well worry about who lost Taiwan as a major investor in U.S. agency securities as the Republic of China has openly questioned their credit quality — even after the federal government has committed hundreds of billions of dollars to bail out mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Beyond that, Washington might well worry that other nations also no longer view its agencies — and now, by extension, the very credit of the United States of America — beyond…

Berkshire Stake Brings Confidence and Credibility to Top China Electric Carmaker BYD

In a move that underscores the potential of China’s auto market – as well as the viability of so-called “green” technology – investing guru Warren Buffett’s MidAmerican Energy Holding Co. will pay roughly $230 million for a 10% stake in BYD Co. Ltd., a Chinese producer of both cars and specialized batteries.

MidAmerican is 87.4% owned by Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRK.A, BRK.B), which just last week paid $5 billion for a stake in Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS). Buffett’s vote of confidence for Goldman was enough to lure skeptical investors back into the treacherous financial services sector and boosted Goldman…

Why China is Still the World’s Best Long-Term Profit Play

While a recent crop of economic data suggests that China is not fully insulated from the economic turmoil that has overtaken the United States and Europe, some of that data is suspect. The upshot: The world’s fastest-growing economy is still much better off than its Western counterparts and probably remains the best long-term option for globetrotting investors.

China’s benchmark Shanghai Composite Index has plummeted nearly 70% in the past year. A big reason for the decline was concern among investors that economic chaos in the United States and Europe would deplete China’s breadwinning export market. But, so far, those fears have…

New Look General Electric Aims to Double its China Business by the Decade’s End

General Electric Co. (GE) expects its business in China to double to $10 billion a year by 2010, as the U.S. industrial giant aims to overcome a sputtering U.S. economy by ramping up its emerging-markets focus.

“We’ve seen great growth in China,” GE Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey R. Immelt told journalists at a recent press conference in Beijing. “The whole focus on water and the environment – well, that’s going to offer, we think, big opportunities for us as time goes on.”

At a time when the U.S. economy has been hamstrung by a severe credit crisis, a burst housing bubble, and energy…