Get into the spirit, y'all

Here we are, just three days from Christmas and our pals in Beijing have gathered by the tree and already begun to hand out goodies. First things first, a promised US$730 billion in rail infrastructure investment by 2020. The plan would expand China’s rail network by 41,000 kilometers and will create around 6 million jobs. Now, 2020 is nice, but what about the short-term? At a weekend meeting between mainland and Taiwan officials, Beijing offered US$19 billion in loans over the next three years to Taiwan companies operating on the mainland. On the good side, Beijing will also purchase US$2 billion worth of flat-panel displays from Taiwan manufacturers. (That’s what we call Christmas spending!) On the bad side, China will have more lawyers, as lawyers from Taiwan will be allowed to work on the mainland. Enter your own lawyer joke here. It also seems that China’s domestic telecom firms will also be getting some special love from Beijing. The minister of the telecom regulator, Li Yizhong, said that the country would be spending US$40 billion on 3G networks over the next two years, but that “strong support” would be given to homegrown TD-SCDMA, suggesting that domestic firms will be riding high.