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The world’s largest wireless technology showcase kicked off on Monday, with excitement over AI’s potential to transform gadgets clashing with concerns over trade tensions fuelled by the United States.The annual Mobile World Congress (MWC), which is set to draw around 100,000 attendees in Barcelona, opened the day before fresh American tariffs come into force on Chinese goods.A dense crowd packed the halls between stands blazing with screens from early morning, hunting out the latest devices and innovations from manufacturers or set to participate in debates about the future of the industry.Telecoms chiefs appealed for easier regulation and greater freedom to merge their businesses in Europe as they seek fatter margins and the scale to sustain infrastructure investment.”It is time for large European telcos to be allowed to consolidate and grow,” said Marc Murtra, head of Spain’s Telefonica.Meanwhile Sunil Bharti Mittal, head of India’s Airtel, urged “government, regulators, please lower taxes on this industry. Please give enough spectrum at affordable costs”.- Tariff blow to China -Many exhibitors at the MWC hail from China, whose products will be hit by an additional 10-percent import tariff on top of the 10 percent already imposed by President Donald Trump since he took office in January.The billionaire president is also pushing neighbours Mexico and Canada to follow suit.”Obviously a global tariff war would not be to anyone’s benefit,” although “nobody really knows what’s going to happen” on trade, said Pekka Lundmark, CEO of major network hardware maker Nokia, at a pre-MWC event late Sunday.Higher costs for trade could impact the entire global tech and smartphone market if Trump keeps the China tariffs in place and extends them to other major economies like the European Union, as he has threatened.China is home to major tech companies such as Huawei, but it also assembles smartphones and other products sold by foreign firms such as Apple and produces key components.Renate Nikolay, the European Commission’s deputy director-general for communications networks, told AFP that the “challenging geopolitical context” means “it’s crucial for Europe to ensure our tech sovereignty and our strategic autonomy in critical sectors”.But with no clear answers on trade, many participants will “try to forget” the issue for now to focus on the promise of AI, predicted Cedric Foray, telecoms chief at consultancy EY.- AI, AI everywhere  -On Sunday, some of the many Chinese smartphone makers attending MWC alongside other global telecom heavyweights focused their pre-show announcements on new products and investments.Manufacturer Honor — a Huawei spinoff — said it was launching a new phase in its development that would transform it into “a global leading AI device ecosystem company”.Honor said its future “intelligent” smartphones, developed with US firms Google Cloud and Qualcomm, would come equipped with AI “agents” that could take on tasks like scheduling events or reserving a table at a restaurant.Competitor Xiaomi, the world’s third-biggest smartphone maker after Apple and Samsung, unveiled a new range of smartphones equipped with high-quality cameras and their own suite of AI features.Generative AI’s capture of tech industry attention since ChatGPT first emerged has made it a must-have for any firm developing new devices.There is “growing AI fatigue” among industry watchers as “it is often hard to understand the tangible benefits” for people actually using devices, said Ben Wood, analyst at tech research firm CCS Insight.But EY’s Foray said he expected “a big difference this year in that AI will be very concrete” in its applications.”Agent” services like those shown off by Honor aim to show consumers how AI can boost their smartphones’ capabilities.Such hurdles have not kept a lid on smartphone sales, which recovered from two years of shrinkage to expand 6.3 percent in 2024 — topping 1.2 billion units, according to market intelligence firm IDC.Manufacturers are optimistic about maintaining the momentum into this year.”The strong growth witnessed in 2024 proves the resilience of the smartphone market,” IDC research director Nabila Popal said.

Asian markets rose cautiously on Monday, with investors eyeing a potential Chinese stimulus package and President Donald Trump’s looming tariffs.Investors were also watching for any last-ditch deals to ward off the levies hitting Mexico, Canada and China due to come into force on Tuesday.Trump has confirmed 25 percent tariffs on products from Mexico and Canada and further imposed another 10 percent on Chinese goods from this week.”Traders are on edge for last-minute negotiations to sidestep US tariffs,” said Stephen Innes, an analyst from SPI Asset Management.”In Asia, all eyes are on China’s National People’s Congress, where traders are betting on a fiscal boost to counter the drag from US tariffs and keep China’s blistering 2024 equity rally alive,” he said.Hong Kong and Shanghai shed early gains ahead of the key Chinese parliamentary meeting that opens on Wednesday, while Tokyo closed up 1.7 percent.Chinese stocks had been boosted in part by data released on Saturday that showed manufacturing activity grew in February after a dip the previous month.Hong Kong was helped by the blockbuster IPO of bubble-tea and drinks giant Mixue Group, which saw its shares jump 40 percent.Jakarta jumped more than four percent after consumer prices in Southeast Asia’s biggest economy eased 0.09 percent year-on-year in February.Sydney rose almost one percent, with Manila and Singapore also in the green, while Taipei, Bangkok and Wellington were down.London, Paris and Frankfurt all opened up, with investors focused on geopolitics as European leaders meet in London to draft a possible Ukraine peace plan after Trump’s clash with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Oval Office last week.Bitcoin slipped 2.7 percent in Asian trade after a six percent surge on Sunday on the back of Trump’s announcement that he was considering adding five digital assets to US strategic reserves.Bitcoin, one of the most volatile assets, fell below $80,000 last week for the first time since November, with other crypto currencies mirroring its downward trajectory.Trump and his wife Melania recently launched their own branded meme coins, sparking accusations they were seeking to make money from his political success.Billionaire Tesla chief executive Elon Musk — a close political ally whom Trump has tasked with leading a government efficiency drive — has frequently promoted crypto currencies on his own social media network X.- Key figures around 0815 GMT -Tokyo – Nikkei 225: UP 1.7 percent at 37,785.47 (close)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: UP 0.3 percent at 23,006.27 (close)Shanghai – Composite: DOWN 0.1 percent at 3,316.93 (close)London – FTSE 100: UP 0.4 percent at 8,847.57Euro/dollar: UP at $1.0393 from $1.0384 on FridayPound/dollar: UP at $1.2588 from $1.2584 Dollar/yen: UP at 150.08 from 149.52 yenEuro/pound: UP at 82.62 pence from 82.51 pence West Texas Intermediate: DOWN 0.11 percent at $69.87 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: DOWN 0.11 percent at $72.93 per barrelNew York – Dow: UP 1.4 percent at 43,840.91 (close)

7-Eleven’s owner is set to replace its CEO as the Japanese convenience store giant battles a $47-billion takeover bid by Canada’s Alimentation Couche-Tard (ACT), reports said Monday.Last week Seven & i said its founding family failed to put together a buyout to fend off ACT’s offer, which would be the largest foreign acquisition of a Japanese firm.Japan’s Nikkei business daily and other media reported that Seven & i’s president Ryuichi Isaka would be replaced by outside director Stephen Hayes Dacus.Dacus, who has also worked for Uniqlo owner Fast Retailing and the Japanese arm of US retail giant Walmart, would also be Seven & i’s first foreign CEO.A formal decision will be made at a board meeting, the reports said, citing sources familiar with the matter. Dacus currently heads a special committee tasked with evaluating ACT’s bid, which the Canadian firm has already sweetened.Dacus and the committee are expected over the next few weeks to unveil strategic proposals to increase the company’s value ahead of an annual shareholder meeting in May, the Financial Times reported.”There have been reports in some news media regarding the management of Seven & i,” the company said in a statement.”However this information was not announced by the Company and no decision has been made by the Company at this time,” it said.Seven & i shares soared as much as 12 percent on Thursday on news that the company’s founding Ito family had failed to put together financing for its alternative offer.On Monday they rose as much as 4.6 percent and closed up 2.37 percent.With around 85,000 outlets, 7-Eleven is the world’s biggest convenience store brand. The franchise began in the United States, but it has been wholly owned by Seven & i since 2005.ACT, which began with one store in Quebec in 1980, now runs nearly 17,000 convenience store outlets worldwide including the Circle K chain.ACT said on Friday that it still hoped to achieve a “friendly agreement”.In September, when Seven & i rejected the initial takeover offer from ACT, the company said it had “grossly” undervalued its business and could face regulatory hurdles.

The European Central Bank is expected to cut interest rates again this week in a bid to boost the floundering eurozone economy, even as debate heats up about when to hit pause. It will mark the central bank’s sixth reduction since June last year, with its focus having shifted from tackling inflation to relieving pressure on the 20 nations that use the euro.With “growth stuttering”, a quarter-point cut at Thursday’s meeting “is a near certainty”, HSBC bank analysts said. A reduction by a quarter percentage point would bring the bank’s benchmark deposit rate to 2.50 percent. The rate reached a record of four percent in late 2023 after the ECB launched an unprecedented hiking cycle to tame energy and food costs that surged after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.But investors will be keeping an eye out for signals from ECB President Christine Lagarde that a pause might be on the horizon, after some officials said it was time to start discussing the matter.Markets have indicated they expect the ECB to bring the deposit rate steadily down to two percent by the end of the year to support a eurozone economy that has showed increasing signs of weakness.- Rate debate -Some policymakers are starting to ask how the central bank should continue on the path downward.Isabel Schnabel, an influential member of the ECB’s board, told The Financial Times last month that policymakers were getting “closer to the point where we may have to pause or halt our rate cuts”.”We can no longer say with confidence that our monetary policy is still restrictive,” she said. Meanwhile Pierre Wunsch, a member of the ECB’s rate-setting governing council and Belgium’s central bank chief, also warned against “sleepwalking” into making too many reductions.Uncertainty about the potential impact of US President Donald Trump’s policies is also clouding the outlook.Some are fearful that eurozone growth could be hit if he goes ahead with levying tariffs on EU goods, while others worry that a broad, disruptive trade war could reignite inflation.Eurozone inflation has already ticked up in recent months, hitting 2.5 percent in January, though ECB officials have voiced confidence it will settle around the central bank’s two-percent target later this year.In the United States, where the economy is in more robust health than in the eurozone, the Federal Reserve paused rate cuts recently after inflation rose and amid uncertainty about the future direction of Trump’s policy.But ING bank analyst Carsten Brzeski pointed out that, while some ECB members were starting to push back against too much easing, there remained others with a “dovish” bias who were “still calling for continued rate cuts”.And most observers do not expect Lagarde, who says the central bank will continue to make decisions “meeting-by-meeting”, to give any clear signals about a potential pause. – Poor outlook -The ECB will also publish updated economic forecasts on Thursday. While inflation predictions are expected to remain stable, the central bank might further lower its growth projections for the coming years, according to economists.The eurozone has eked out meagre growth in the past two years amid a poor performance in its biggest economies, Germany and France, leaving the single currency area lagging behind the United States and China.While France still faces political instability, there are hopes the recent German election could lead to the formation of a more stable governing coalition that could enact economic reforms. Despite the debate on a potential pause in rate cuts, Brzeski said the poor outlook might leave the ECB with little choice but to further ease borrowing costs. “There is still a high risk that the eurozone economy underperforms over the coming months,” he said. This “will force the ECB to bring rates down to at least two percent — whether they like it or not.”

Asian markets climbed on Monday on hopes that China will announce a huge stimulus package that will help offset US President Donald Trump’s looming tariffs against Chinese goods.Investors were also watching for any last-ditch deals to ward off the levies hitting Mexico, Canada and China due to come into force on Tuesday.Trump has confirmed 25 percent tariffs on products from Mexico and Canada, and further imposed another 10 percent on Chinese goods from this week.”Traders are on edge for last-minute negotiations to sidestep US tariffs,” said Stephen Innes, an analyst from SPI Asset Management.”In Asia, all eyes are on China’s National People’s Congress, where traders are betting on a fiscal boost to counter the drag from US tariffs and keep China’s blistering 2024 equity rally alive,” he said.Ahead of the key Chinese parliamentary meeting opening on Wednesday, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng and Japan’s Nikkei climbed more than one percent, while Shanghai was also up.Chinese stocks were boosted in part by data released on Saturday that showed manufacturing activity grew in February after a dip the previous month.Hong Kong was helped by the blockbuster IPO of bubble-tea and drinks giant Mixue Group, which saw its shares jump 40 percent.     However, bitcoin slipped 1.3 percent on Asian markets after a six percent surge on Sunday on the back of Trump’s announcement that he was considering adding five digital assets to US strategic reserves.Bitcoin, one of the most volatile assets, fell below $80,000 last week for the first time since November, with other crypto currencies mirroring its downward trajectory.Both Trump and his wife Melania recently launched their own branded meme coins, sparking accusations that they were seeking to make money from his political success.And the billionaire chief executive Elon Musk — a close political ally whom Trump has tasked with leading a government efficiency drive — has frequently promoted crypto currencies on his own social media network, X. – Key figures around 0230 GMT -Tokyo – Nikkei 225: UP 1.0 percent at 37,516.30 (break)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: UP 1.2 percent at 23,223.83Shanghai – Composite: UP 0.5 percent at 3,335.01Euro/dollar: UP at $1.0419 from $1.0384 on FridayPound/dollar: UP at $1.2612 from $1.2584 Dollar/yen: UP 150.28 from 149.52 yenEuro/pound: UP at 82.62 pence from 82.51 pence West Texas Intermediate: UP 1.12 percent at $70.54 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: UP 1.09 percent at $73.60 per barrelNew York – Dow: UP 1.4 percent at 43,840.91 (close)London – FTSE 100: UP 0.6 percent at 8,809.74 (close)

Asian markets climbed on Monday on hopes that China will announce a huge stimulus package that will help offset US President Donald Trump’s looming tariffs against Chinese goods.Investors were also watching for any last-ditch deals to ward off the levies hitting Mexico, Canada and China due to come in force Tuesday.Trump had confirmed 25 percent tariffs on products from Mexico and Canada, and further imposed another 10 percent on Chinese goods from this week.”Traders are on edge for last-minute negotiations to sidestep US tariffs,” said Stephen Innes, analyst from SPI Asset Management.”In Asia, all eyes are on China’s National People’s Congress, where traders are betting on a fiscal boost to counter the drag from US tariffs and keep China’s blistering 2024 equity rally alive,” he added.Ahead of the key Chinese parliamentary meeting opening on Wednesday, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng and Japan’s Nikkei climbed more than one percent, while Shanghai was also up.Meanwhile, Bitcoin slipped 1.3 percent on Asian markets after a six percent-surge on Sunday on the back of Trump’s announcement that he was considering adding five digital assets to the US’ strategic reserves.Last week saw bitcoin, one of the most volatile assets, fall below $80,000 for the first time since November, with other crypto currencies mirroring its downward trajectory.Both Trump and his wife Melania recently launched their own branded meme coins, sparking accusations that they were seeking to make money from his political success.And the billionaire chief executive Elon Musk — a close political ally whom Trump has tasked with leading a government efficiency drive — has frequently promoted cryptocurrencies on his own social media network, X. – Key figures around 0230 GMT -Tokyo – Nikkei 225: UP 1.0 percent at 37,516.30 (break)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: UP 1.2 percent at 23,223.83Shanghai – Composite: UP 0.5 percent at 3,335.01Euro/dollar: UP at $1.0419 from $1.0384 on FridayPound/dollar: UP at $1.2612 from $1.2584 Dollar/yen: UP 150.28 from 149.52 yenEuro/pound: UP at 82.62 pence from 82.51 pence West Texas Intermediate: UP 1.12 percent at $70.54 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: UP 1.09 percent at $73.60 per barrelNew York – Dow: UP 1.4 percent at 43,840.91 (close)London – FTSE 100: UP 0.6 percent at 8,809.74 (close)

A high-stakes father-and-son feud has plunged Singapore property giant City Developments Ltd (CDL) into turmoil, with the private boardroom dispute of one of the city-state’s wealthiest families erupting into public view this week. The battle of words between CDL’s executive chairman Kwek Leng Beng and his son Sherman Kwek has exposed deep rifts within the Forbes-ranked fourth-richest family in Singapore.Laced with allegations of corporate missteps, governance breaches and personal entanglements, the fight threatens to escalate into a bruising court battle over control for a slice of the multibillion-dollar real estate empire. The first public sign of trouble came Wednesday, when CDL — a component of Singapore Exchange’s benchmark Straits Times Index — abruptly called for a trading halt, followed by a statement cancelling its scheduled financial year 2024 results briefing.Then came the bombshell: The 84-year-old patriarch publicly accused his son and CDL’s chief executive of orchestrating an “attempted coup at the board level”. The younger Kwek, along with the majority of the board, had appointed two additional directors to “consolidate control of the Board” and CDL, he said.To block the alleged power grab, Kwek Leng Beng filed a lawsuit and later announced he had secured a court order to halt the changes to the CDL Group’s board and management.Sherman Kwek, 49, a Boston University graduate, denied the allegations, saying “there has been no attempt by us to oust the chairman”.Calling his father’s move an “ambush”, he instead pointed to a deeper source of tension — Catherine Wu, a board adviser to a CDL subsidiary, but who his son accused of interfering in the company’s affairs.”She has been interfering in matters going well beyond her scope, and she wields and exercises enormous influence. These matters have troubled us as directors,” Sherman Kwek said.”Due to her long relationship with the Chairman, efforts that were made to manage the situation were done sensitively, but to no avail.”The dispute has exposed a power struggle within CDL — Singapore’s largest real estate company by market capitalisation — and the Kwek family, whose empire is worth $11.5 billion according to Forbes. In early February, Kwek Leng Beng had sought Sherman’s dismissal as CEO, saying his latest move came after “a long series of missteps”, citing a massive $1.4 billion loss in a 2020 “debacle”, and poor investment decisions in the UK. CDL’s share price has also “consistently underperformed peers since (Sherman) assumed leadership in 2018″, the patriarch said.”(Young) people may make business mistakes in their careers and that is understandable, but circumventing corporate governance laws is a red line,” Kwek Leng Beng said.”As a father, firing my son was certainly not an easy decision” but the stakes were “simply too high to allow reckless power grabs to destabilise the company”, he said. Shares of the $3.4 billion firm remain suspended, and CDL has been downgraded by firms including JPMorgan Chase & Co, according to Bloomberg.- ‘Reckless actions’ -CDL started out as a loss-making business when Kwek Leng Beng, his father Kwek Hong Ping, and his brother Kwek Leng Joo bought it in 1971.Under Kwek Leng Beng, it saw a massive expansion, with its portfolio today spanning residences, offices, hotels, retail malls and integrated developments in Singapore, as well as China, Japan, the United States and across Europe. Its move into hospitality turned subsidiary Millennium & Copthorne Hotels into the finance hub’s largest international hotel group, with assets that include The Biltmore hotel in London’s Mayfair and Millennium properties in New York’s Wall Street and Times Square.The elder Kwek said preserving his legacy was among the reasons why he was fighting his son and his boardroom allies.”The reckless actions of a faction seeking to consolidate unchecked control not only undermine the foundations of CDL’s governance but also put at risk the very legacy we have built over the decades,” Kwek Leng Beng said.With the courts now involved and CDL’s leadership in question, this bitter family dispute is far from over.Sherman Kwek has defended his move to get Catherine Wu off the Millennium & Copthorne board as “necessary” for CDL’s interest, adding that the majority directors will “continue to uphold corporate governance and accountability”. His father — who made no mention of Wu in his response — asserted that “stripping away any meaningful authority of the Executive Chairman is a coup”. “It is now a matter before the court and I will let the court decide. Justice always prevails,” Kwek Leng Beng said. 

Wearing a traditional Indonesian black hat and shirt, President Prabowo Subianto speaks to the camera in an Instagram video, asking his people how he can help them after his election last year.”Who hasn’t received aid from me? What are your needs right now?” Prabowo appears to ask viewers in the clip posted in November.But while the Indonesian leader’s mouth moves and his eyes blink, the words he utters are part of a fraudulent deepfake scam uncovered by police last month that has swindled Indonesians across 20 provinces.Those ensnared by the message were asked to contact a WhatsApp number and hand over between 250,000 and one million rupiah ($15-$60) as an “administrative fee” to get aid that never materialised.Since last year’s Indonesian election, experts have warned of a tidal wave of deepfakes — audio, images and video appearing to come from a known person but which are in fact the work of scammers using artificial intelligence tools.And victims say the hoaxes are so sophisticated they leave others vulnerable to being conned too.”People should be more careful. Don’t be easily fooled by the lure of prizes,” said Aryani, 56, who handed over 200,000 rupiah to fraudsters after seeing a deepfake video of a prominent Indonesian businessman.”I need money, but instead I’m asked to send money. They even made video calls with me, as if I were talking directly to them.”During the Southeast Asian country’s presidential campaign, deepfakes became a prominent tool to spread misinformation both harmful and helpful to candidates.But now that technology has fallen into the hands of criminals looking to make cold, hard cash.- Wide circulation -AFP’s fact-checkers found the account behind the Prabowo clip has posted dozens of similar videos appearing to show various high-profile figures, including Indonesian Vice President Gibran Rakabuming Raka.Those videos also promote the bogus financial aid.Police arrested a suspect who pocketed 65 million rupiah ($4,000) from the scam, Himawan Bayu Aji, director of the Indonesian National Cyber Crime Unit told reporters in February.He said officers detained a second person involved in another scam that also used deepfake technology, without disclosing the amount raised.AFP Fact Check’s investigation found the spread of such videos had a much wider reach than the two accounts that police announced.Deepfake videos of the president, a popular ex-general, were still circulating on social media after the arrests, including dozens on TikTok with the hashtag “Prabowo shares blessings”.At least 22 TikTok accounts were touting the same fraudulent scheme since Prabowo took office in October, AFP journalists found, with some appearing to take advantage of his recent rise to the presidency.One account with more than 77,000 followers racked up 7.5 million views on a fabricated video of Prabowo apparently doling out financial assistance.Another account with thousands of followers has shared 100 videos since January alone, the majority featuring deepfake videos of the president offering cash.TikTok said it had removed one of the deepfake scam videos and the associated account, adding it would continue to remove any that violated the platform’s community guidelines, which prohibit misleading posts.Facebook parent Meta did not respond to AFP’s request for comment.AFP, along with more than 100 other fact-checking organisations, is paid by TikTok and Meta to verify social media posts that potentially contain false information.- More accessible -Aribowo Sasmito, a co-founder of Indonesian fact-checking organisation Mafindo, said his team were finding new deepfake scams every week because of their prolific spread online.”We have started to see deepfake videos since last year as AI tools have become more accessible and affordable,” he told AFP.Schemes using deepfakes of prominent figures appear to be on the rise. Tech billionaire Elon Musk and Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau are among a string of celebrities targeted in recent years by sophisticated impersonations to push cash scams.Aribowo said his team of fact-checkers was working harder than ever to debunk these scams using the latest technology available to criminals.”We noticed the quality of these videos has improved over time. It has become more difficult to distinguish between fake and real videos,” he added.”The challenge is the volume of these scams.”

A simple handshake between President Xi Jinping and once-shunned entrepreneur Jack Ma sent Chinese tech stocks booming in recent weeks as it was interpreted as the latest sign the sector is being brought in from the cold — though experts advise caution.Beijing launched a regulatory blitz on the industry in 2020 that triggered a massive sell-off, wiping hundreds of billions of dollars from major tech firms’ market value.But there are increasing signals that it is adopting a friendlier attitude, as domestic economic woes persist and leaders nervously eye a heightened trade war with the United States.”Beijing cannot accomplish its national ambitions of technological independence from the United States and ultimate dominance of cutting-edge technologies without the private sector,” Shehzad Qazi, managing director of China Beige Book, told AFP.The shock release in late January of a sophisticated AI chatbot by Hangzhou-based start-up DeepSeek — which matched US rivals’ performance seemingly at a fraction of the cost — could be seen as a stark example of that.DeepSeek was praised by authorities, with its founder also present at the high-level business symposium where Xi met Ma in Beijing nearly two weeks ago. Xi’s warm greeting of the Alibaba co-founder, who had stayed out of the spotlight since making disparaging comments about the nation’s regulators in 2020, is “the latest sign of China more firmly aligning private enterprises with the (Communist) Party’s economic and national security ambitions”, said Qazi. But he warned that “Beijing isn’t interested in helping companies produce record-breaking earnings or spurring mega rallies in the stock market”. “The outlook for private enterprises is not nearly as bright as the recent market optimism would have you believe,” he said. Observers are keenly awaiting a key annual political gathering in Beijing in the coming days, in the hope it might show whether the government’s recently warmed attitude will translate into concrete actions.- Enter AI -A softening towards the tech sector has been under way since 2023, with regulators taking a more supportive stance in a bid to revive business confidence. China has struggled to meet official growth goals over the past few years as the world’s number two economy is beset by a property sector crisis and sluggish consumption.Stimulus measures unveiled last year are slowly taking effect, but a threatened trade war with US President Donald Trump’s new administration could cause further economic instability.With hurdles yet to be overcome, Beijing is now eyeing tech products — AI in particular — with renewed interest.”In theory, AI can help China break through stagnation and deflation” in addition to solving the future labour crunch caused by the country’s declining population, analysts at ANZ Research wrote in a recent note.The symposium of business leaders, they wrote, showed that adoption of AI in China now stands to be further accelerated by revamped policy support.Local authorities across the country have in recent weeks issued orders to promote the use of AI tools such as DeepSeek to assist in governance.”DeepSeek’s success in AI has revived investor hopes for broader AI adoption and increased enterprise demand in China,” said UBS in a note.The DeepSeek phenomenon has also ignited an intense race within the domestic industry to develop advanced chatbots, with Tencent’s release Thursday of its Hunyuan Turbo S model representing the newest contestant.Tencent claims the new model’s instant responses differentiate it from DeepSeek, which it said needs to “think before answering”, resulting in slight delays in generating results.- ‘Moment’s notice’ -In a move to reassure the business community, Chinese lawmakers last month advanced a draft law on the private sector that the state-backed Global Times said would “cement legal protection” for firms.But analysts say a private-sector boom will only be encouraged as long as it aligns with Beijing’s strategic objectives. During the 2010s tech giants were allowed to rapidly grow, but the Communist Party has historically been wary of runaway private-sector expansion.The recent gathering with entrepreneurs has echoes of a similar one held in 2018, when Xi told business leaders he was there to “boost (their) confidence”.Two years later Beijing launched its flurry of anti-monopoly and anti-competition charges against the firms.”Investors appear to have interpreted (the meeting with Xi and Ma) as a signal that the government’s pivot towards greater private-sector freedom, which has been underway since 2023, is set to be sustained,” wrote James Reilly, a senior economist at Capital Economics.However, he added that the “lack of checks and balances in China means that this attitude shift towards the tech sector could reverse at a moment’s notice”.