China Decode: Apple Doubles Down on China as Trump Blinks

Summary

The Prof G Pod: China Decode

Episode: Apple Doubles Down on China as Trump Blinks
Date: March 24, 2026
Hosts: Alice Han & James Kynge
Podcast Network: Vox Media Podcast Network

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Episode Overview

This episode unpacks three intertwined stories shaping China’s global influence in 2026: Apple’s deepening relationship with China amid mounting regulatory pressure, the geopolitical maneuvering following Trump's postponed Beijing summit, and a cultural revolution manifested in China’s museum boom. Hosts Alice Han and James Kynge provide data-rich analysis and sharp commentary on these topics, focusing on the bigger picture for multinational business, international diplomacy, and Chinese society.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Apple’s High-Stakes Bet on China

[02:37–05:48] Tim Cook’s Chengdu Visit and Apple’s China Strategy

• Tim Cook’s recent trip to Chengdu for a high-profile Apple Store opening marks Apple's 50th anniversary and underscores how central China remains to Apple’s global fortunes—even as US-China tensions escalate.
• iPhone sales in mainland China are up 23% in 2026, outperforming a shrinking broader smartphone market.
• Apple’s strategic move: Lowering App Store fees in China from 30% to 25% (a bigger cut than in the US), following pressure from both the Chinese government and state media.
• Alice Han: “Despite Apple leaning on the iPhone for growth, Apple is still struggling to find traction in AI.”
• The iPhone 17’s popularity, especially its Hermes-orange variant, reflects the blending of luxury branding and local cultural resonance (“orange” in Chinese sounds like “success”).

[05:48–10:22] Foreign Companies in the Squeeze

• The Chinese government’s leverage over Apple is part of a wider pattern impacting many American and European companies deeply invested in China (Qualcomm, Tesla, ASML, VW, BASF, etc.).
• Chinese state media (People’s Daily) labeled Apple’s behavior “monopolistic,” signaling that more regulatory or commercial concessions may be demanded.
• James Kynge:

  “In China, it’s the Chinese government that calls the shots. Apple has to heed Beijing’s demands—making commercial concessions, just like other Western giants.” (06:45)

• Debate on sustainability: Will China’s upper classes keep Apple buoyant despite competition from domestic brands like Huawei, Oppo, and Xiaomi?

[10:22–14:00] The AI Gap

• While Chinese smartphone brands integrate advanced AI features and chips, Apple is lagging:
  • “Apple Intelligence,” the brand’s generative AI, is not yet available in China owing to regulatory delays.
  • Apple is behind not only in hardware AI integration but also in cultivating local partnerships that could accelerate Chinese regulatory approvals.
• Alice Han:

  “Apple is behind in this horse race compared to the AI providers—whether it’s the LLMs, Frontier Labs like OpenAI or Claude…” (11:05)

• Manufacturing dependency: Despite shifts to India and Southeast Asia, roughly 80% of Apple’s manufacturing capacity—especially for iPhones and iPads—remains in China.

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2. Trump’s Beijing Summit Delay & Geopolitical Dynamics

[18:02–26:46] Iran Crisis, US-China Relations, and Global Trade

• Trump's postponement of his summit with Xi Jinping frustrates Beijing, which interprets the move as Washington leveraging the Iran conflict to pressure China.
• Chinese state media (e.g., Global Times) frame the US as drawing China into the Strait of Hormuz conflict—suggesting the US “set the fire” and now “wants the world to help put it out.” ([26:46])
• Alice Han:

  “Right now, it seems like Beijing is playing a wait-and-see game… They’ve just sent a special envoy to the Middle East.” (18:46)

• James Kynge:

  “In front of all of these assembled dignitaries… [Premier Li Qiang] said China was committed to being a ‘cornerstone of certainty’ and a ‘harbor of stability’ in a world dominated by rising trade protectionism and upheavals…” (20:03)

• Strategic obliqueness: Chinese officials avoid direct criticism of the US, but PBOC Governor Pan Gongsheng takes aim at “single sovereign currency” systems—an oblique swipe at US dollar hegemony.
• Moves toward “de-dollarization”: Central bank-led digital yuan bridges with the UAE, Thailand, Saudi Arabia, and Hong Kong show a 2,500-fold increase in tokenized cross-border settlements since 2022, with 95% settled in yuan.
  • Alice Han: “Currently… about 8% of global trade settlement is in yuan. That could rise, helped by U.S. instability.” ([22:41])

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Memorable Quotes

• “China is using this crisis in Iran… to damage US credibility on the global stage, to portray the US as a global wrecking ball… and to make commercial capital.”
  — James Kynge ([25:17])

• “I could foresee China actually benefiting from the… quagmire that the US has gotten itself into financially by increasing CNY usage in global trade settlement.”
  — Alice Han ([22:41])

• “China will portray itself as the mediator to end this conflict… a PeaceMaker, whereas the U.S. [is] a kind of a wrecking ball.”
  — James Kynge ([28:40])

• “The Americans are very much bogged down in what is happening in the Middle East.”
  — Alice Han ([26:46])

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3. China’s Museum Boom: Culture, Soft Power, and History-Making

[35:37–44:57] Museums as Symbols of Cultural Ambition & Ideological Narratives

• Museum explosion: From just a handful in 1949 to over 6,800 museums today, with a new museum reportedly opening every two days and about 1.5 billion annual visits as of late 2025.
• Types range from mainstream (dinosaur museum) and quirky (paper airplane, meme, mental illness) to the once-controversial (sex museum relocated from Shanghai to Tongli).
  • James Kynge:

    “Chinese are big collectors… that goes back millennia. The most famous is the Terracotta army… 8,000 life sized clay warriors.” ([36:30])

• Museums are now key tools for China’s “curated national storytelling,” blurring cultural soft power and state propaganda. Many famous homes and contemporary art spaces are now state-endorsed sites telling selective versions of history.
• Collections as status: China’s billionaire art-collecting couples are spending millions on rare artifacts (e.g., a “chicken cup” at $36M, a Ming dynasty tapestry at $45M).
• Alice Han:

  “It’s in the DNA of Chinese people to be obsessed with history and learning, especially about the past.” (39:23)

• Debate about museums’ ideological role: Are they benign history and art spaces, or instruments of control?
  • James Kynge:

    “He who controls the past controls the future.” ([42:06])

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Predictions

[45:12–47:43] What’s Next?

• James Kynge:
  • Political prediction: China will soon emerge to mediate peace in the Iran and Ukraine conflicts, both to increase its diplomatic capital and open doors for postwar investment and construction.
    • “At some point these conflicts have to end. And I think that China will be focusing on the after game already—really interesting.” ([45:19])
• Alice Han:
  • Tech prediction: China will be the first and fastest globally to adopt and integrate agentic AI into everyday life—especially via its leading super apps (Alibaba, Tencent). Expect rapid growth in apps that book travel, manage schedules, even provide dating advice—all through personal AI agents.
    • “We’re going to see China really be the first and the fastest to adopt… agentic AI personal assistants in day to day life.” ([46:28])

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• James Kynge (on China’s power over Apple):

  “It’s an extraordinary realization that Apple is worth about US$3.7 trillion… But it isn’t really the company’s shareholders that actually call the shots, at least not in China. In China, it’s the Chinese government…” ([06:45])

• Alice Han (on the potential for de-dollarization):

  “That number [yuan usage in trade] could easily rise… helped along by concerns [about] U.S. hegemony, concerns about U.S. instability…” ([22:41])

• Alice Han (on the museum boom):

  “It’s very much in the DNA of Chinese people to be obsessed with history… especially in the Taiwan National Palace Museum, the jade cabbage that looks exactly like cabbage but is made out of jade.” ([39:23])

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Important Timestamps

• Apple in China – Market, Regulation, and AI: [02:37–14:00]
• Trump’s Beijing Summit Delay & Diplomatic Subtext: [18:02–22:41]
• De-dollarization & China’s Financial Strategy: [22:41–26:46]
• China as Peacemaker/US as "Wrecking Ball": [26:46–31:43]
• Museum Boom & Cultural Storytelling: [35:37–45:12]
• Predictions – China’s Diplomatic and Tech Futures: [45:12–47:43]

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Conclusion

“Apple Doubles Down on China as Trump Blinks” delivered layered insights into how economic, political, and cultural forces intertwine across borders. The hosts’ analysis demonstrates how deeply China’s choices matter to global markets, diplomatic stability, and cultural narratives. From Apple’s regulatory challenges and manufacturing dependencies to China’s strategic patience in diplomacy and soft power ambitions, the episode highlights an era where every move by companies and governments is both intensely local and undeniably global.

Transcript

[A]

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[A]

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[B]

Tim Cook is in China at the moment. He's been opening a big store and previous to that he was at the China Development Forum in Beijing and there he was using some mollifying language. He said, we are committed to colle collaborating with our partners across China and with all of you to make this vision of progress at Apple a reality. It didn't really seem to address the issue head on, but I think it was supposed to mollify opinion in China that is turning against Apple to some degree. So to me, what is happening to Apple in China is that it's being pressured by the Chinese government to make commercial concessions and it's already made one. But China wants foreign

[C]

welcome to China Decode. I'm Alice Han.

[B]

And I'm James King.

[C]

In today's episode of China Decode, we're discussing how Tim Cook's China visit highlights Apple's reliance on iPhone sales in the mainland. Why Trump's Beijing Summit delay exposes the broader context of US China competition in the Iran conflict, and how China's museum boom is reshaping its culture. Now that's all coming up, but first let's do a quick check in with how the Chinese markets are starting the week. On Monday, both the Shanghai A share index and the Hang Seng H share index closed down nearly 4% as investors scrambled to adapt to the possibility of tighter monetary policy. This was the worst day for the Hang Seng since the Liberation Day tariff announcement, no doubt affected by the Iran crisis. Precious metals company Lapu Gold and Zijin Mining Group fell more than 5% after the price of gold tumbled, and tech giants Alibaba and Tencent both ended the day in the red. Before we go to the episode, a quick announcement. China Decode now has a weekly newsletter. We go beyond the topics we cover here on the podcast and give you even more data and analysis on the most important stories coming out of China this week. [e-mail] profgmedia.com it's free for now, so be sure you get subscribed soon. That's chinadecode.profgmedia.com alright, let's get into it. Last week, Tim Cook was in Chengdu, China for a high profile Apple Store event marking the company's 50th anniversary. His visit underscored how crucial China remains for Apple, even as the US China tensions rise and regulators in China push for a more open app store ecosystem. IPhone sales are booming in the mainland, up 23% so far in 2026, while the broader smartphone market shrinks. Meanwhile, Apple has cut its app store fees in China from 30% to 25%, though Beijing is signaling it wants more concessions. Despite Apple leaning on the iPhone for growth, Apple is still struggling to find traction in AI James. This is an exciting topic because we did have, as you recall, Patrick McGee who wrote Apple in China. So this is a topic that we've discussed previously. But what has been interesting to me relative to, I would say the discussion a year or two ago is that Apple is not quite dead in China. Even though we have heard stories and seen data of manufacturing moving further south to India for instance, or Southeast Asia, and that the market within China is shifting more strongly to the local variants, whether it's Huawei or Oppo. It seems that the strong performance this year and Tim Cook's trip to China suggests that there still is a market for Apple. I'm just not really sure how sustainable it is, but certainly I've seen from Chinese social media that this especially the orange cased iPhone that came out, iPhone 17 has been viral because it's known as the Hermes orange, like the Hermes designer brand. But what's your take on this, James?

[B]

Yes, I think China remains highly important to Apple. And to me, this story is really bigger than just Apple in China. This is a story that says in this case, when China says jump, Apple will jump, at least to some degree. That's because Apple has invested so much in the China market and because Apple gets such a large proportion of its global revenues from China. And the reason why I think this is such a big issue is because Apple is not the only company experiencing these types of dynamics in the China market. In fact, there are lots of US companies and lots of European companies that are in the same boat that China is so important to them that when the government of China says, you've got to do this or you've got to do that, they would be rash to ignore such instructions completely. And as you mentioned, we had Patrick McGee on the podcast and he said that basically China has captured America's most famous company. It's an extraordinary realization that Apple is worth about US$3.7 trillion on the stock market. But it isn't really the company's shareholders that actually call the shots, at least not in China. In China, it's the Chinese government that calls the shots. And that's why, as you mentioned at the top, Alice, Apple had to bring down the commission it earns on the Apple app store for Chinese users. As I mentioned, Apple is not the only company that derives a huge proportion of its total global revenues from China. In the US there are other companies in the same bracket. Qualcomm, the semiconductor maker, is one. Texas Instruments is another. Tesla, which of course makes cars and also energy generation and storage technology. Micron, Qorvo, Broadcom, all chip makers from the US are in the same bracket, just to name a few. From Europe, asml, the huge Dutch semiconductor equipment manufacturer. The carmakers from Germany, VW and BMW, the big German industrial companies like BASF and Siemens, the Swiss luxury company Richemont, Rio Tinto, the mining company. All of these companies derive a very large proportion of their global revenues from China. And therefore, when the Chinese government says something or issues an order or an instruction to these companies, they would be very rash to refuse that instruction point blank. And I think this is a crucial aspect of the whole commercial and geopolitical dynamic that the Western companies get into when they start investing so much in China. But let's just return to the Question of Apple. What happened in order was that earlier this month the People's Daily, which of course is the mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party, criticized Apple for its monopolistic behavior. This came just days after Apple said it would drop its typical commission on the mainland App store purchases from 30% to 25%. This was a big concession by Apple because it drops the App Store commission to below what it is for US users. But it wasn't enough for China. The People's Daily editorial said that Chinese users and developers still face many restrictions that Beijing believes are anti competitive and we'll have to see what Apple does in the future. As you mentioned, Tim Cook is in China at the moment. He's been opening a big store and previous to that he was at the China Development Forum in Beijing. And there he was using some mollifying language. He said, we are committed to collaborating with our partners across China and with all of you to make this vision of progress at Apple a reality. It didn't really seem to address the issue head on, but I think it was supposed to mollify opinion in China that is turning against Apple to some degree. So to me, what is happening to Apple in China is that it's being pressured by the Chinese government to make commercial concessions and it's already made one, but China wants more.

[C]

Yeah, it's interesting. I agree with all these points, James. I would just take another, you know, vector of analysis to this and look at it from the vantage point of Chinese consumers. Because if we had this conversation two years ago, I would have said, you know, the writing is in the wall for Apple. China is making amazing phones with amazing cameras. You know, you just look at Xiaomi, you look at Huawei and they're making great phones for a fraction of the price. And they have AI chips installed as well. So super competitive in the AI domain as well. I would be worried if I were Apple, but I think again, this begs the question, is this sustainable long term? There seems to be still a market for Apple. Maybe it's not the aspirational middle class, maybe it's the upper echelons of Chinese society that can still afford to buy an Apple iPhone. But the virality of it was really interesting to me. So in Chinese, the chengzi, which is the word for orange, sounds like the word for success, Chengguan. So, you know, in the year of the Horse, a lot of people were talking about this orange colored phone was seen as being very lucky or auspicious. So that was part of the virality, certainly of the iPhone 17 that made it very, very successful as a model. But longer term, what I worry about is Apple's place in AI ecosystem. Because in the US too, I mean, Apple is behind in this horse race compared to the AI providers, the AI downstream and upstream providers, whether it's the LLMs, Frontier Labs like OpenAI Claude, or even if it's the data center providers like Oracle or Salesforce, it's not clear to me that they are going to take advantage of AI. And more importantly, in the Chinese context, how is it actually going to work? So as of yet, Apple's Apple intelligence, so it's AI generative AI product that it offers on all its iPhones which are available in the west, is not available yet in China. It's subject to approval. Now apparently that approval process was delayed by the trade disputes last summer. So we're going to have to see whether this year they will finally get the green light because as of yet, these other phones, these other Chinese phones are going to be more advanced in the on device AI market. And then the next question is how will Apple integrate some of the new moves in agentic AI that we're seeing? We've just seen announcement that Tencent's OpenClaw personal assistant or agentic AI has disappointed to the downside. And so that's obviously taken a hit in terms of stock price. But I think the next question as we see AI evolve, and we've talked about this previously, James, is how a device is going to embed these personal assistants, these agentic AI platforms. And I'm not sure if Apple is at the forefront of it. I think that a lot of the other Chinese providers are, but I think the statistics are pretty dazzling. 26% year on year growth in the first two months of this year, that's pretty good by Apple standard.

[B]

Those are great points you're making about Apple and AI in China. Chinese companies are really moving ahead quickly in AI. The number of applications of different uses, startups in AI all over the country, it is a fever at the moment in China. And it's quite possible as you raise the possibility that Apple could get left behind, particularly if its AI products are delayed for whatever reason from coming into the China market. I really do see that as a risk that you point out.

[C]

Yeah, super interesting. And just to continue what you said about how China still is really important for Apple's manufacturing, it manufactures still about 80% of Apple's manufacturing capacity globally. That's 55% of the MacBook products, 80% of the iPads and over 80% of the iPhones. Now there's a big push to get India to increase its share, but at least in the next few years, in the short term, it seems like they really still need China to manufacture Apple goods across the board. Okay, we'll be back with more after a quick break. Stay with us.

[A]

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[C]

Welcome back. Trump's postponement of his Beijing summit with Xi Jinping is sending ripples through global diplomacy and markets. Chinese officials are frustrated and state run outlets like the Global Times are mocking the delay, suggesting the US Is using the conflict to pull China into policing the Strait of Hormuz. Meanwhile, behind the scenes, Beijing sees the Iran crisis as a chance to make political capital at the expense of the U.S. james, it's been sleepless nights for for a lot of my friends who are oil traders or just traders in general. I'm curious how you've been faring in the last few weeks, but I have been struck by the lack of real Chinese media coverage on Iran. I think even relative to visit Venezuela, there's been a lot of focus obviously on the new five year plan that's come out on some of the domestic data that have come out. But I've been struck how there hasn't been a lot of talk within Chinese media about Iran and how China actually hasn't been that vocally critical of the US's campaign. Now that may change if we in the coming days see Trump escalate in terms of boots on the ground to try to stabilize the strait or even decapitate the leadership in Tehran. But right now I sense that the Chinese are playing a wait and see game to see what pans out. They've just sent a special envoy to the Middle east, to the region to talk to the Gulf states, to the Iranians. I sense that maybe there are moves early on to see if they can be involved in a, in a longer term diplomatic peace process. But right now it seems like Beijing is playing a wait and see game. What's your view?

[B]

Yes, absolutely. I think China's strategy for the moment is to make rhetorical capital out of the US actions. I thought in particular recently Li Qiang, the Premier made a speech at the China Development Forum, which is China's version of Davos. It's a place where CEOs of companies from the west who can be relied upon to praise China, collect with Chinese officials and academics from the west who can also be relied upon to lavish praise on China. And this took place over the weekend in Beijing. And if you look at what Premier Li Qiang said in front of all of these assembled dignitaries in the Diaoyutai State Guest house, he said that China was committed to being a cornerstone of certainty and quote, a harbor of stability in a world that is dominated by rising trade protectionism and upheavals in the rules based international order. He did not mention the US by name at any point, but it was very clear that he was making a contrast between China's role and the role of the us. He also said, talking about trade, that he wanted to optimize and balance the development of trade and expand global economic and trade ties with the rest of the world. And to me, you know, although this was an oblique reference to the us, it really struck a very strong point against Washington. The other thing I thought was really fascinating about what went on at the China Development Forum was that the governor of the central bank, Pan Gong Sheng said that he sort of took aim at the US dollar and he described, without naming the us, he described some countries persistent trade deficits as being the result of a quote, international monetary system dominated by a single sovereign currency. So basically he's saying that all of the US trade deficits are partly the result of the strength of the US dollar. And he wanted to deflect criticism of China's 1.2 trillion US dollar trade surplus in doing this. So I would say that this is a fairly blunt criticism of the U.S. china still doesn't like to call the U.S. out by name and I think it still wants President Trump to visit China even after he obviously postponed the visit that had been expected to take place on April 1st. But certainly I would say at the moment that China's trying to portray itself as this harbor of stability for the world as the US engages in the war in Iran and the war in Iran threatens to spread beyond Iran itself.

[C]

It's interesting when we talked about the five year Plan and the two sessions in a previous episode, we talked a lot about self sufficiency and de risking in supply chains. To your point and when you quoted the PBOC governor, there is I think sort of a collision of events right now pointing towards this theme of de dollarization. Whether it's the PBOC governor talking about it, it's coming up in Chinese media. I think in irrespective of what's happening in Iran, it came out of the five year plan as well. To increase CNY usage in trade settlements. I picked up on a particularly interesting data point. So China over the last few years has been working with the major central banks of Hong Kong, Thailand, UAE and Saudi Arabia, so some of these Gulf states in the Middle east to increase trade settlements via these central bank bridges, digital tokenized cross border transactions. And since 2022 we've seen 2, 500 fold increase in the use of these tokens through these M bridges, so to speak. That's about $55 billion and around, I think 95% of that settlement of that sum is in yuan because China's been the big proponent of it diplomatically and through these financial institutions. And in the last couple days we've seen China announce that they've exp the number of commercial banks that are going to use ecny. I think that one of the longer term themes maybe from this crisis is that the Gulf states become more and more like Russia. So if we think about the increase in UN settlement between Russia and China since 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine, that has been very favorable to CNY usage. We don't have the exact data on the ground, but there has been an increase in CNY usage in cross border trade settlement, notably for oil and gas. I believe a couple years ago there was a Gazprom deal agreed by Putin and Xi in which there would be a 5050 yuan ruble split in terms of settlement. So I could foresee China actually benefiting from the morass and quagmire that the US has gotten itself into financially by increasing CNY usage in global trade settlement. Currently, according to Swift, it's about 8% of global trade settlement. That number could easily rise, I think a couple of percentage points in the next couple years, helped along by concerns U.S. hegemony, concerns about U.S. instability and the instability it's causing in other regions around the world. I'm curious if you're your view on this, James, because I certainly am seeing more chatter about this in financial markets.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, I think you're dead right there, Alice. I think China is using this crisis in Iran and obviously the conflict is spreading beyond Iran now to damage US credibility on the global stage, to portray the US as a global wrecking ball and as you rightly say, Alice, to make commercial capital. And one area that they're trying to make commercial capital, it's not immediate, but in the longer term is to slowly replace the dominance of the US dollar with the renminbi. And these movements are kind of tectonic in nature. They happen slowly, but once the they do change, then the whole global economic and geopolitical system changes in their wake. It really does matter a great deal what the world uses to, you know, to transact its trade and investment flows. At the moment it's the US dollar, but the renminbi is rising fairly, fairly strongly. And I think we can now envisage a future in which the renminbi has a much greater a share of global settlement, both for trade and for investment. So, yeah, I mean, these are very big forces that have been unleashed. China is, I wouldn't say enjoying the US's misfortune, but it is certainly capitalizing on the US's misfortune and the damage that the US is doing to its reputation.

[C]

Yeah, you know, it goes without saying on the oil and energy front, it is also at a disadvantage. China is right on the oil and energy front. You know, if, if WTI goes north, continues to go north of 100, that is going to cause pressure. If supply chains and oil continue to be constricted, that is going to cause pressure for Beijing. But you're right, geopolitically and diplomatically, if we look at it from that vector purely, I think this has been an unforced error by the Americans in which that has caused an opportunity for China to gain leverage not only just in the Middle east, but also in potentially US China trade talks that are still ongoing because, you know, the, that the US is distracted and bogged down in the Middle east, the less likely they're going to be firing shots at China in trade and technology export controls, it seems. And I'm just citing a Global Times piece that was really interesting that came out, I think about March 15, that one op ed in the Global Times says the US has set the fire. Now they're asking the world to help it put it out and split the bill. I thought that that was an interesting image. And it's sort of goes to the heart of how the Chinese perceive this is a mess of the American making and that the Chinese do not want to get involved in any collaborative effort. And it reminds me to some extent what happened in 56 of the Suez crisis. You know, you had Britain, France trying to, you know, take control of the Suez Canal, another major choke point in Egypt. And they did not get the approval of then US President Eisenhower, who decided to knock back old imperial regimes, but back the Egyptian President, Nasser. I think a similar thing is happening now with the Chinese deciding that they're not going to back the Americans in collaborating to de mine the strait or to unblock the strait and put pressure on the Iranians. So that's been interesting. Thus far, I haven't seen the Americans really react. I think that they're very much bogged down in what is happening in the Middle East.

[B]

Yes, I think so. And I think this gives China an opportunity to act as the state, the peacemaker, according to Wang Yi, China's foreign minister. He said that the urgent priorities now are firstly to curb the spread of the conflict and prevent other countries from becoming involved. Other countries like Saudi Arabia and the uae, both of which are friendly nations with China and both of which have been struck by missiles from Iran. And China's also called for a unified international push for an immediate ceasefire and further mediation efforts. And this goes back to what you were saying earlier, Alice. I think that China will portray itself as the mediator to end this conflict, or perhaps after the conflict has ended, to step in as a mediator between the nations in the region and thereby it will portray itself even more as the PeaceMaker, whereas the U.S. as I said earlier, it will want to be portraying as a kind of a wrecking ball. So I think China's strategy is pretty clear. Trump, of course, called on China to help assure the shipping through the Straits of Hormuz. And I think that the idea that China would cooperate directly with the US to further the US objectives in anything to do with this war in Iran is completely pie in the sky. China will not want to do that because it wants to portray itself as separate and in opposition to what it calls an unjust war, which has been started by the U.S. i think for China, they are keeping their eye on the propaganda gains that they can make from the US War in Iran.

[C]

Yeah. And just to back up your point of China being a peacemaker in the region, there is a history of this. Right. China, back in 2023, was responsible for the rapprochement between the Saudis and the Iranians that led to a diplomatic detente and a rapprochement. So they have a track record I'm on. The side that you are on, James, is that they will play a part in any peace negotiation in the region, given the outsized commercial, economic and diplomatic influence they have with a lot of the Gulf and Iranian players. If I'm looking at this from a realist perspective. Allah. John Mearsheimer or Graham Allison, I am worried that the wrecking ball analogy that you used has actually empowered the axis of ill will. If you think about the countries, the original countries within that nomenclature were Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea. With oil prices going up for the conceivable future, that benefits Russia, Iran is hard to decapitate. We've probably replaced one leader with a more hardline leader. And China, to your earlier point, James, looks to be benefiting diplomatically. I'd be worried if I were Kissinger come back from the grave and looking at what Washington's doing.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, I think it's too early to say because we don't know what the end of this war will be. It could be that the US Wins, and then the US Gets to set the terms of whatever peace may follow that or whatever situation may follow that. And under those circumstances, maybe the US Emerges from this looking slightly better than it does at the moment. If the US can restore shipping in the Straits of Hormuz, the price of oil comes down, Trump gets to sound more like a statesman on the world stage, then maybe the pendulum swings back again in the US Favor in terms of international opinion on this action. But at the moment, I think there's no doubt that China is making propaganda capital from this great point.

[C]

And to your point, a lot can change in the next week or two, so we will stay braced for the news. Okay, let's take one last quick break. Stay with us.

[A]

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[C]

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Welcome back. China's museum boom is rewriting the nation's cultural story. From just a handful of museums in 1949 to over 6,800 today. The expansion of galleries, libraries, archives and museums reflect a deliberate strategy to link heritage, urban development, tourism and soft power. State backed cultural districts now dominate the landscape, shaping what histories are told, what art is seen, and how China projects itself globally. Even private and contemporary art spaces operate within this structured ecosystem, highlighting a shift from independent experimentation to curated national storytelling. James, are you an avid museum goer and tell me, what's your favorite museum in China?

[B]

I am, actually. You know, I really do enjoy going around the museum. I thought you would. I bet you do too, Alan.

[C]

Yeah, I do too.

[B]

I didn't know the extent of this trend. It seems to be the case that in China there's a new museum opening almost once every two days. And these days there are perhaps, you know, more than 7,000 museums and about 1.5 billion annual visits as of late 2025. So whatever numbers you're using, this is a huge, huge trend in China. And I've been looking at some of the eye catching museums that there are in China. You know, some of them are fairly mainstream, like the Zigong Dinosaur Museum, which is in a southern province of China. And its point of differentiation is that it's a museum obviously of dinosaur bones or fossils that are built right over the pit where the fossils were actually first found. Going to another end of the spectrum, there is also a museum in China for mental illnesses. It's called the Black Museum. And it has sort of immersive displays. Like you can sort of feel what it's like to be going through a hallucination. And of course, there's a sex museum in China. This museum used to be in Shanghai, but it used to, but it became a bit too sensitive and it had to move to a smaller town, the town of Tongli in Jiangsu Province. And it has over a thousand exhibits, including erotic paintings and ancient sex toys and Ming dynasty sexual furniture. I also heard that there's a paper airplane museum. I mean, of all the things to have a museum about this is in Wuhan and it shows off about 200 classic paper planes, those that can fly a long way, those that spin around, stunt gliders, et cetera. And of course, because we're in the digital age, there's a Chinese meme museum as well. But I just think this is a fascinating topic, partly because I kind of get the feeling that there is a cultural aspect to this. Chinese are big collectors and I think this is a culture that goes back millennia. If you look at the use of grave goods in graves across the centuries in China, there's all kinds of collections. Of course, the most famous is the Terracotta army, which was built for the first emperor of China, Qin Shi Huang, and which has about 8,000 life sized clay warriors and countless bronze weapons. And of course, it hasn't even been fully excavated yet. So, you know, there is this sense of that, you know, collecting things, it's very deeply in Chinese culture. What would you say about that, Alice? Have you noticed that?

[C]

I love the way you said that? I completely agree. I've never actually thought about it that way, but I think that that is a big part of Chinese culture. It's interesting when, you know, you hear talk about what Chinese leadership is like is that they have an acute sense of history. They're obsessed with history. I remember the story that back in the day, the top Chinese leadership were being asked to read by Wang Qisan, who was, remember for a time the anti corruption minister, really the fire brigade men, right next to Xi Jinping, to read history books, including Tocqueville's Democracy in America. So I think it's very much in the DNA of Chinese people to be obsessed with history and to be obsessed with learning, but in particular learning about the past. I remember as a kid going to museums in Taiwan and in Beijing where not only is there great historical relics, but great artistic relics. I remember this obsession, especially in the Taiwan National Palace Museum. This one, probably the most expensive thing there is this jade cabbage that looks exactly like cabbage, but it's completely made out of jade. These sort of curiosities, I think is a big focus in a lot of these museums. And as you were talking about, I was thinking about some of my favorite museums. And interestingly enough, I find that in China I see a lot more of these. Although I would say in the UK you do see this too. These houses, former houses of famous people being turned into museums or memorials, as you say. So one of my favorites is actually Song Qingling's house in Shanghai. She's the former wife. She was the former wife of the father. Modern China. Sun Yat Sen, Dr. Sun Yat Senior. And her house is really beautiful. You get to see the interior of the space and how they lived while seeing the historical moments and chapters in her life. Another museum that I really love is the Shanghai History Museum. And apparently they've got a new Qipao museum that's just come up. So an exhibition dedicated to a very traditional Chinese style dress that was really popular from the 20s onwards and that you also see in the West. Yeah. It's interesting to me how in the last few years we've had an expansion of different types of museums beyond what we've been discussing, beyond just the historical and the curiosities to some of these cultural elements that you're discussing. You know, planes and sec. You know, paper planes and sex and Qipols. But I want to bring it back to another point, which is the party's role in history making. But curious what you have to say about this, because certainly there is the more benign aspect of museums, but there also is more of an ideological aspect to it. And I'm curious if you have thoughts on that.

[B]

Yes, I mean, you know, there are endless numbers of expressions that you could cite. There's a traditional Chinese expression, examine the past to understand the present. And then there's the more kind of foreboding, non Chinese phrase from, I think it was 1984, the George Orwell novel, He who controls the past controls the future. And so I think there are two overtones there that both are valid, actually. And we've spoken about the cultural interest that Chinese people have in the past and we've spoken about the number of collections and museums there are throughout China. I'd like to bring it around to the money side of this because this is also really considerable. I used to collect a few things when I was in China. A bit of furniture here and there. None of it was worth very, very much money. But I've been reading about some of the top collectors in China. There's Liu Yi Chen and Wang Wei. There are. They're often cited as China's top collecting power couple. And they've spent billions of renminbi on art. They spent US$36 million on a Ming Dynasty chicken cup. It's not, it's. I mean, you mentioned the, the cabbage, which I've actually seen in the, in Taiwan's National Museum. You know, this is a rather nondescript cup if you ask me, but they bought it for US$36 million. And they also spent US$45 million on a Tibetan tapestry. So, you know, there are lots of collectors all throughout China and some of them are spending huge amounts of money. And, you know, it would. It's quite surprising on the number of different things that Chinese people collect and the number of different things in which a market is now being created. There's a market even for those Mao badges. You know, those badges that everybody used to have to wear during the period of Chairman Mao, particularly during the Cultural Revolution. I think many Chinese people hate to look back at that part of their history, but others are now collecting those badges, and there is a bit of a market in that kind of thing as well. Do you collect any Chinese stuff, Alice?

[C]

I don't as of yet, but I do have some pieces that have been gifted to me. And at some point I probably will be a collector of Chinese Taoan, like teacups that, that I used in tea ceremonies. And then the other thing, because my parents are Buddhist, you know, some Buddhist artwork that has been given to me or that my father has as well. But I'm not yet a collector. But at some point I think I will. What about you, James?

[B]

Yeah, I mean, I'm afraid I don't have the financial resources to be called any kind of a collector, but I got a few things here and there. You know, I got a couple of bits of porcelain from my time in China and a couple of bits of furniture which I rather like, but they're not worth that much.

[C]

All right, James, you know what time it is? It is prediction time. What do you see in your crystal ball for the future this week?

[B]

Okay. Last week my prediction was about Chinese AI, emotional companions. So this week I thought I'd go to the other end of the spectrum and give a political prediction. I guess we're a broad church here, aren't we? I think that at some point China will emerge from whatever it's doing behind the scenes on both the Iran conflict and on the Ukraine conflict to take a more public role. And I think this role will be to use its powers to mediate some aspect of the peace that follows each of these conflicts. And I think it will do this partly as a conduit to help it invest and subsequently rebuild, I mean, physically rebuild, construct infrastructure and buildings in both of these countries. So I guess that's a fairly bold prediction given where we are both in the Ukraine conflict and in the Iran conflict. But at some point these conflicts have to end. And I think that China will be focusing on the after game already really, really interesting.

[C]

So mine is surprisingly about AI. So we're sort of reversing roles as opposed to geopolitics. I would say say that even although some of the Tencent announcement was negative about the integration of agentic AI, that China is going to be at the forefront globally of agentic AI adoption and integration because it already has this strong super app ecosystem. When you think about the use of Alibaba or Tencent in everyday people's lives as these super apps, I think we're going to see China really be the first and the fastest to adopt and integrate these agentic AI personal assistants in day to day life. So for instance, and I know this is already happening, getting your agent to book flights, trains, set your meetings and agenda, text somebody, give you dating advice, everything. I think that that will be much more heavily integrative in everyday people's lives in China versus the rest of the world. And I think that we'll start to see a boom in apps doing agentic AI in China, but in particular the Tencents and Alibaba's being the front runners of the pack because they have those embedded super app ecosystems.

[B]

Very interesting.

[C]

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