Investors urged to think health

The full opening-up of China's hospital market is providing huge opportunities for foreign investors although risks exist, according to an industrial report from The Boston Consulting Group.

EU talks on failing banks break down

European Union talks on how to assign losses at failing banks broke down as conflicts on "core issues" doomed 19 hours of talks in Luxembourg.

London and Beijing agree currency swap

Bank of England Governor Mervyn King and his Chinese counterpart Zhou Xiaochuan agreed to a three-year currency swap line to promote financial stability and aid trade between China and Britain.

Market roundup

Third parties aid customers' needs

With more Chinese people aware of a larger variety of products available to them, objective suggestions from third parties are starting to be appreciated.

Big data offers a goldmine

Internet observers analyzing the benefits of the sensational deal between Alibaba Group Holding Ltd and Sina Corp's Twitter-like Weibo service reckon data resources may be a hidden treasure for both companies.

Guanxi suffers from social networking

The importance of guanxi in executives' career management in China is being seen as changing as a result of online career management and social media sites, according to a recently released survey.

Tech bytes

The challenges of urbanization

Urbanization | Zheng Yangpeng

Taxing Internet sales - a burden too far for some?

Commerce| Shen Jingting

Strategic inaction best way forward?

Nothing appeared more serious than the market-wide setback for Chinese stocks as the Shanghai Composite Index fell to 2000 and may, as some analysts fear, fall further to 1900.

Microblog insights

Topic 1: Stocks in the United States, Europe, China and Japan all plunged on Thursday as investors fretted over the US Federal Reserve's plan to begin reducing its stimulus later this year if the economy strengthens. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Wednesday said the central bank's policy of buying $85 billion in bonds per month could start to wind down this year if the economy is strong enough and could finish in mid-2014.