At least one person doesn't agree with me

Following my post yesterday about the declining value of China trade along with Alibaba and Global Sources shares, I note with interest that the boys from Hangzhou are fighting back. Alibaba CEO David Wei is putting on a more than brave face and proposing that "the United States subprime mortgage crisis won't hurt growth at Alibaba.com - and may even help small and medium e-commerce firms win more deals".

The article goes on to quote him saying "the US slowdown is mainly affecting large buyers and suppliers, so in this regard, small and medium players will have more opportunities". Really? That is just the opposite of what I have been hearing with the smaller players being knocked for six while the larger ones are better able to restructure their supply chains. But what do I know. 

A comment on yesterday's post over on Plaxo's Pulse social networking site asked whether the value of the US$ was also having an impact on this equation. You'd have to say that it is. On that point, David Wei and I appear to agree as he is advising "Chinese exporters to capture business potential in markets such as Japan, India and Russia to offset the impact caused by the weaker US dollar". Quite right.