S8 Ep669: 16. China Navigates Trade Dependencies and Energy Security During War GUEST: Gordon Chang, Andrew Collier SUMMARY: Andrew Collier analyzes China’s economic situation, highlighting its 15% industrial profit increase and massive strategic oil reserves. De
The John Batchelor Show
John Batchelor
4.5 • 2.8K Ratings
🗓️ 31 March 2026
⏱️ 11 minutes
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Summary
16. China Navigates Trade Dependencies and Energy Security During War GUEST: Gordon Chang, Andrew Collier SUMMARY: Andrew Collier analyzes China’s economic situation, highlighting its 15% industrial profit increase and massive strategic oil reserves. Despite these strengths, China remains vulnerable to global trade downturns and the ongoing property market collapse.,, China saw a 15% rise in industrial profits in early 2026, which may be attributed to global stocking of goods before the war,. The country is prepared for energy shocks with the world's largest strategic oil reserve, estimated to cover 140 days of imports,. However, Andrew Collier warns that China is extremely trade-dependent and faces growing international opposition to its tech exports, while its domestic property market is not expected to hit a bottom until at least 2027,,. (16)
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| 0:00.0 | I'm John Bachelor of Gordon Chang. I'm Gordon G. Chang, my colleague and co-host and friend, |
| 0:21.1 | and we're very pleased to welcome the author of China's Technology War, Why Beijing |
| 0:26.8 | Took Down Its Tech Giants and Other Insights into the Non-Transparent People's Republic of China. |
| 0:34.0 | Andrew Collier, who is also the managing director of Orient Capital Research. |
| 0:39.3 | Andrew, a very good day to you. |
| 0:40.9 | The headline in China looks positive for the regime that is much troubled by the real estate whole, |
| 0:47.5 | the consumer reluctance, and the general overall cost of oil. |
| 0:51.6 | However, 15% industrial profit. What is that talking about? It was for January and |
| 0:57.4 | February. What does it point to? Good day to you, Andrew. Well, basically, China's had a very slow |
| 1:04.3 | 2025. They've cranked a lot of money into the property market and into the coal industry, |
| 1:09.8 | but unfortunately, they weren't getting much |
| 1:11.5 | payback. They seem to have had a bit of a turnaround in the first part of 2020, into 2026, |
| 1:20.7 | which it means that there is demand for some of their industrial goods. Most of that is coming |
| 1:25.5 | from the tech sector and autos, as a lot of countries industrial goods. Most of that is coming from the tech sector and autos as a lot of |
| 1:30.8 | countries are buying their goods, but I don't expect this to be a long-range turnaround. |
| 1:35.2 | Gordon, what's your view on this? I think they had a great January and February, surprised me. |
| 1:41.8 | It shows that they are exporting. The question will be, can they |
| 1:46.2 | continue that, especially because oil prices are probably going to affect profits at some point, |
| 1:53.2 | as they will in every country? Yeah, if I could throw two seconds in, I have the feeling a lot of |
| 1:57.9 | that was because people are concerned about geopolitical instability, |
| 2:01.7 | and they may have been stocking up on goods ahead of what turned out to be the war. |
| 2:07.7 | So given how sluggish industrial profits were, they were near flat for 2025, |
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