Even for the prepared and informed, at the recent World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC 2025), China has still taken the world by surprise with the debutante of its fleet of over 150 AI-powered humanoid robots. Indeed 2025 marks the beginning of commercialization and production of these futuristic robots, now made reality. While humanoid robots have captured the imagination of the popular media, there has been a more important revolution in the broader robotics industry, where China has emerged, as the global powerhouse, just as it did in renewable energy and electric vehicles. In this article, we discuss how humanoid industrial robots have quickly been integrated in China’s production lines, filling the productivity void from the country’s aging population, while further driving down the manufacturing production costs with high degree of automation with these embodied AI applications.

Aug 06, 2025

Equities around the world rebounded from early-April “Liberation Day” lows, as markets increasingly reckoned the White House’s tariff bark may be worse than its bite, leading stocks in China—one of America’s biggest trading partners, and an economy viewed to be in the crosshairs of Trump 2.0 trade policy—to rise in Q2. In this article, Dr. Phillip Wool, Global Head of Research of Rayliant Global Advisors, discusses the presently muted impact of tariffs on China’s exports and explain what might be needed to ensure a sustained A-share rally.

Jul 31, 2025

Asia USD Investment Grade Credits and Saudi Government Sukuk have outperformed in a global fixed income market that has been shaken by fiscal profligacy, geopolitical tensions, tariff uncertainties, and even oil market volatility. The Premia J.P. Morgan Asia Credit Investment Grade USD Bond ETF and Premia BOCHK Saudi Arabia Government Sukuk ETF have emerged from this stress-test as effective alternatives in portfolios – delivering stable income, and uncorrelated returns, while still trading at a spread over US Treasuries with further room for spread compression. Indeed, their higher yields of 4.8%-4.9% (4.8% for the Premia Asia Credit Investment Grade USD Bond and 4.9% for the Premia Saudi Government Sukuk) are outstanding, considering their lower corporate and government leverage, and comparable or superior credit ratings versus global peers.

Jul 24, 2025

Saudi Arabia’s tremendous transformation since the launch of the Vision 2030 strategic initiative has been accompanied by significant development of its capital markets – including its fixed income market which now offers some of the most attractive risk-adjusted returns in the government and investment grade fixed income space. In this article, we discuss about how our newly launched Saudi Arabia Government Sukuk ETF offers a timely alternative amid current market environment, and for sukuk investors and fixed income and multi-asset allocators stable income, attractive yield spread as well as uncorrelated returns.

Jun 22, 2025

China is undergoing a profound economic shift anchored in industrial upgrading and technological self-reliance. Amidst global macro uncertainties, the country's relentless focus on innovation across strategic sectors—ranging from semiconductors and artificial intelligence to robotics, green energy, and biotech—is building the foundation for sustained long-term growth. In this article, we discuss how these structural advances, often overlooked amid cyclical challenges, are already yielding tangible outcomes and positioning China at the forefront of the next wave of global industrial transformation. As policymakers are busy drafting the 15th Five Year Plan, and wrapping up the last stretch of the 14th Five Year Plan, it is also important to note how these innovation-led developments would continue to be at the forefront of the policy initiatives, and inform us of market opportunities ahead.

Jun 22, 2025

Amidst months of volatile global equity market performance and unprecedented trade policy uncertainty, the first quarter brought one of the most important events on China’s economic calendar: Beijing’s annual “Two Sessions” meeting, which offers a chance for officials to set economic targets and announce policy priorities for the year ahead. In this article, Dr. Phillip Wool, Global Head of Research of Rayliant Global Advisors, discusses how China policymakers are responding to Trump 2.0 tariff threats, and what it all means for A shares performance going into Q2.

May 07, 2025

The state of China’s consumer spending is better than how it has been portrayed in the media. Further, the latest developments and data suggest that the growth rate will get even better: The Chinese Government is placing more emphasis on domestic consumption as a driver of growth as global trade is disrupted by higher US tariffs. Meanwhile, the latest revenue figure from JD.com suggests a quickening of the pace of retail spending in the final quarter of 2024. The online retailer just reported 13.4% year-on-year growth in sales for the December quarter – the fastest growth rate in almost three years. This compares with its full year revenue growth rate of 6.8%, pointing to the rising growth momentum. In this article, we discuss about the consumption phenomenon in China, driving the decent growth of per-capita consumer spending in China at 5.1% YoY in real terms in 2024 (far higher than that of 1.8% in US).

Mar 20, 2025

It is worth noting that while the significant rally in BATJX – Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, JD.com, Xiaomi – and the offshore listed tech/internet players have dominated headlines lately, the bottoming out of the overall China market since the policy shift in late September last year started onshore, with A shares experiencing a sharper rebound first and with a more slower but sustained trend, as domestic investors were more sensitive to the reset in policy tones and significant shift in government’s commitment to reviving economic growth and capital market activities. In this article, Partner & Co-CIO David Lai discusses the factors that could drive a more sustained outperformance in onshore equity market, and why it is a good entry point to rotate from offshore to onshore companies in policy supported sectors.

Mar 20, 2025

While the market is focused on the size of the fiscal stimulus emerging from the Two Sessions currently underway in Beijing, there are other important drivers that could shape the outlook for the relative performance of Chinese equities versus US stocks. The first is about relative valuation; the second is cyclical – that is, the turning of the US economic cycle; and the third is secular – that is, the sustainability of the repeated use of the “policy bazooka” in the US. In this article, our Senior Advisor Say Boon Lim discusses what causes the underperformance of US market since the Inauguration of President Trump, and diversification out of the US equities has become more important than ever while the slump in consumer confidence and potential debt crisis continue to add downward pressures on the US economy.

Mar 09, 2025