Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng has met with several U.S. finance executives in the last month as Beijing seeks to build relationships ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s planned tariffs on China.
He Lifeng is one of China’s four vice premiers, and heads the ruling Chinese Communist Party’s economic and finance committee.
“The Chinese are seeking all possible avenues to access those now ascending to power in Washington. The Trump Team,” said Peter Alexander, founder of Shanghai-based consulting firm Z-Ben Advisors. “Back channeling is how China operates, even prefers, when building lines of communications.”
Goldman Sachs said it was aware of the reports. The two other financial firms did not respond to a CNBC request for comment.
“I do think the Wall Street folks that are coming into commerce and treasury will serve a moderating role on the trade protectionist side,” said Clark Packard, research fellow at the Cato Institute. “It’s all relative because I do think there’s going to be something protectionist on the trade side. Those voices will be the voices that work to mitigate some of that.”
“Especially at Treasury they’re pretty worried about market reaction,” Packard said. “The one thing that can truly maybe scare Trump away from a really aggressive [policy] would be the market reaction.”
U.S. stocks are on track for a relatively rare second straight year of more than 20% gains. After tumbling early this year, Chinese stocks rebounded after Beijing signaled a shift toward stimulus in late September. Chinese authorities on Monday affirmed that supportive stance in a high-level meeting.
‘Keeping its options open’
With actions such as hosting Wall Street executives and imposing export controls on critical minerals, Beijing is keeping its options open, said Zongyuan Zoe Liu, who is Maurice R. Greenberg senior fellow for China studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. “They are preparing for the worst-case scenario.”
But she cautioned that it’s unlikely that financial institutions can do much to mitigate tariffs and tensions with the U.S. “Business transactions and Wall Street executives, one way or another, they would not give up opportunities in any market as long as it fits into their profile,” Liu said.
Chinese financial media summarized He Lifeng’s meetings with the U.S. executives as sending a signal on Beijing’s willingness to open up the financial sector and attract long-term, foreign institutional investment. Foreign capital inflows are often cast by Chinese state media as a symbol of support for the domestic market.
The Chinese vice premier also met with Invesco President and CEO Andrew Schlossberg in Beijing on Nov. 12, and HSBC Group Chairman Mark Tucker on Nov. 14, according to state media. HSBC said it had nothing to add to the report. Invesco did not respond to a request for comment.
U.S.-China capital markets have been “arguably the most dynamic and inter-connected aspect” of the bilateral relationship in the last two decades, said Winston Ma, adjunct professor at NYU School of Law.
Check out the companies making headlines before the bell. Warner Bros. Discovery – Shares jumped nearly 9% after Warner said it will split into two publicly traded companies by next year. One company will host WBD’s streaming services and movie properties, while the other will include its cable networks such as CNN and TNT Sports. Tesla – Shares of the electric vehicle maker dropped about 2% after Baird downgraded the stock to neutral from buy. The firm said that CEO Elon Musk’s comments on robotaxi plans are “a bit too optimistic” and that Musk’s relationship to President Donald Trump adds “considerable uncertainty.” EchoStar – Shares tumbled 11% after the Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar, said the telecommunications company is considering filing for bankruptcy under chapter 11 . The company is trying to protect its wireless spectrum licenses that are under review by the Federal Communications Commission, the report said. Robinhood , Applovin – Shares of Robinhood and Applovin each fell about 4% after neither name was added to the S & P 500 on Friday, as both names were considered possible candidates for inclusion in the index . Robinhood soared more than 13% last week leading up to the rebalance announcement, while Applovin advanced more than 6%. IonQ – The quantum computing stock gained more than 7% after the company announced that it’s agreed to acquire Oxford Ionics in a deal valued at $1.075 billion in cash and stock. The deal is expected to close in 2025. McDonald’s – The fast-food chain’s stock slipped nearly 1% on the heels of a Morgan Stanley downgrade to equal weight from overweight. Morgan Stanley said the company hasn’t been insulated from pressures on the fast food sector. Moelis & Co. – Shares were marginally lower. On Monday, The Wall Street Journal reported that CEO Ken Moelis is planning to step down from the role at the investment bank. He said in an interview that he’s expected to become executive chairman, effective Oct. 1. Co-president Navid Mahmoodzadegan is slated to become CEO, the report said. — CNBC’s Alex Harring, Fred Imbert and Sarah Min contributed reporting.
People wait in line for T-shirts at a pop-up kiosk for the online brokerage Robinhood along Wall Street after the company went public with an initial public offering earlier in the day on July 29, 2021 in New York City.
Spencer Platt | Getty Images
Robinhood shares sold off on Monday as the online brokerage was snubbed in the latest quarterly rebalance of the S&P 500 Index after months of speculation that it could earn a coveted spot in the benchmark.
Shares of Robinhood dropped nearly 5% in premarket trading. The stock has rallied 3.3% Friday to bring last week’s gain to over 13% before the S&P Dow Jones Indices said after the bell that the S&P 500 would remain unchanged.
Just last week, Bank of America called Robinhood a top candidate to join the S&P 500 during the big reshuffling in June. The S&P 500 rebalance, which typically comes on the third Friday of the last month in a quarter, is usually an impactful event as it can spark billions of dollars of trading and spur passive funds to snap up its shares. Companies being added to the index can generally expect funds like that to buy huge amounts of their shares in the coming weeks.
Crypto exchange Coinbase was the latest beneficiary of such an inclusion. The stock skyrocketed 24% in the next trading session following the announcement last month.
Still, Robinhood has had a major comeback this year so far with shares doubling in price. The online brokerage’s shares hit a fresh record high last week amid a rebound in both stocks and crypto. The company had fallen out of favor after the GameStop trading mania of 2021 fizzled and the collapse of FTX triggered a sell-off in digital assets.
LONDON — Britain’s financial services watchdog on Monday announced a new tie-up with U.S. chipmaker Nvidia to let banks safely experiment with artificial intelligence.
The Financial Conduct Authority said it will launch a so-called Supercharged Sandbox that will “give firms access to better data, technical expertise and regulatory support to speed up innovation.”
Starting from October, financial services institutions in the U.K. will be allowed to experiment with AI using Nvidia’s accelerated computing and AI Enterprise Software products, the watchdog said in a press release.
The initiative is designed for firms in the “discovery and experiment phase” with AI, the FCA noted, adding that a separate live testing service exists for firms further along in AI development.
“This collaboration will help those that want to test AI ideas but who lack the capabilities to do so,” Jessica Rusu, the FCA’s chief data, intelligence and information officer, said in a statement. “We’ll help firms harness AI to benefit our markets and consumers, while supporting economic growth.”
The FCA’s new sandbox addresses a key issue for banks, which have faced challenges shipping advanced new AI tools to their customers amid concerns over risks around privacy and fraud.
Large language models from the likes of OpenAI and Google send data back to overseas facilities — and privacy regulators have raised the alarm over how this information is stored and processed. There have meanwhile been several instances of malicious actors using generative AI to scam people.
Nvidia is behind the graphics processing units, or GPUs, used to train and run powerful AI models. The company’s CEO, Jensen Huang, is expected to give a keynote talk at a tech conference in London on Monday morning.
Last year, HSBC’s generative AI lead, Edward Achtner, told a London tech conference he sees “a lot of success theater” in finance when it comes to artificial intelligence — hinting that some financial services firms are touting advances in AI without tangible product innovations to show for it.
He added that, while banks like HSBC have used AI for many years, new generative AI tools like OpenAI’s ChatGPT come with their own unique compliance risks.