Sharp China: Elon Musk’s Surprise Trip to Beijing; A Third Plenum Set for July; An Uneventful Blinken Visit; Xi’s Trip to Europe

This episode of Sharp China is free for everyone.Show Notes:On today's show Andrew and Bill begin with a surprise, 24-hour trip to China for Elon Musk, and a Sunday meeting with Premier Li Qiang. Topics include: The Musk meeting as PRC response to mounting scrutiny in the US, the benefits to both sides of the Tesla-PRC relationship, and why this week's news may not answer Tesla's long term questions in the Chinese market. From there: Parsing the readout from the April Politburo meeting, including insights into how leadership sees the economy now, an announcement for the long-awaited Third Plenum, and policy changes that may or may not materialize in the months to come. At the end: Takeaways from Secretary of State Blinken's visit to Beijing last week, Xi Jinping prepares to travel to the EU amid a flurry of investigations into PRC entities and actors, and an emailer asks about the veracity of officially reported PRC economic data. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit sinocism.com/subscribe