| Abstract: | Chinese stock markets plunged along with their global counterparts—the benchmark index lost 26.82 percent in the first half of this year, the worst performance among nations worldwide. China’s manu- facturing sector slowed and was clouded by a sense of pessimism as the June purchasing managers’ index dropped by 1.8 percentage points compared with May. Electronic manufacturer Foxconn plans to build a new large-scale plant in Henan Province to cut costs. Ping An Insurance tries to merge two banks to establish a stronger banking presence. Shanghai topped other cities as the most important financial center in China and a growing world financial hub. |
