Society

on the February 4th, Peoples in Taiyuan, Shangxi province, bless the OX year by using 3600sqm to lay out a character "fu"- happiness.

China, the world's second-biggest energy consumer, may enact a stimulus plan for the oil refining and petrochemicals industry before a gathering of the country's legislature to help spur the slowing economy, an official said.

Government departments are currently discussing the stimulus proposal, an official at the China Petroleum and Chemical Industry Association said today. The plan may be unveiled before the annual meeting of the National People's Congress next month, said the official, who declined to be identified.

China's economy expanded at the slowest pace in seven years in the fourth quarter of 2008, cutting consumption of fuels and petrochemicals. Refineries posted a loss of 149.3 billion yuan ($22 billion) in the first 11 months of last year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said Tuesday.

The stimulus package, to cover three years of project spending, needs to have an "immediate effect" to bolster the industry, the official said. The planned expenditure may include 100 billion yuan to upgrade refineries and 400 billion yuan for petrochemical projects, the Shanghai Securities News reported today, without saying where it got the information.

"It is good for the industry because the plan will mean a coordinated effort in project construction, avoiding wasteful investments," Yin Xiaodong, an analyst with Citic Securities Co., said by telephone in Beijing.

Stimulus measures

China is considering additional measures beyond a 4 trillion-yuan spending plan to support its economy amid the global recession, the Financial Times reported Tuesday, citing an interview with Premier Wen Jiabao in London. The steps have to be taken preemptively before an economic retreat, Wen said, according to the newspaper.

"Some taxation incentives are also likely to be included in the stimulus package to help boost domestic demand," Yin said.

China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., the nation's biggest oil refiner, gained 1.5 percent to close at HK$4.17 in Hong Kong trading today.

The National People's Congress convenes every March, with almost 3,000 lawmakers congregating at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. Last year's conference ran from March 5 to March 15.

 

Detroit -- US auto sales plunged to a 27-year low in January, a steeper-than-expected drop that took the slumping US market below China's for the first time.

The two US automakers struggling to restructure under a $17.4 billion government bailout led the market lower. Chrysler LLC posted a 55 percent sales plunge. Sales for General Motors Corp were down 49 percent.

The bleak results were one of the first indicators of the depth of the US economic recession at the start of 2009, underscored by sharp declines by the industry's stronger players.

Toyota Motor Corp, the world's top automaker, was hit with a 34 percent sales decline. Sales were off almost 30 percent for Nissan Motor Co and 28 percent for Honda Motor Co.

Industry-wide sales dropped 37 percent, taking the annualized sales rate to 9.57 million vehicles, the lowest level since 1982. But that understates the depth of the downturn since the US population has increased about a third since.

"The truth is that the entire auto industry finds itself in the eye of this economic storm," Bob Carter, Toyota's US manager for its flagship brand, told reporters.

Ford Motor Co, considered the best-positioned of the embattled US automakers, posted a 40 percent drop that one analyst said would strain its stated intent to make it through the downturn without an emergency infusion of government cash.

"Even with a boost from the anticipated federal stimulus plan, we see consumers taking a cautious approach to large ticket discretionary purchases," S&P equity analyst Efraim Levy said in a note for clients.

GM cut its first-quarter production plan by almost 10 percent. Both GM and Chrysler extended new discounts to try to clear inventory and get production lines moving again.

"We're in the mouth of this monster, and we have a lot of work to do," Chrysler sales chief Steven Landry said.

US auto sales account for as much as one-fifth of retail sales. The downbeat results added weight to the view that the battered sector will be a further drag on US output.

GM, like other automakers, blamed tight credit for the downward spiral in sales since September. The depressed sales rate for January put the US market below China's in sales volume for the first time, the automaker said.

"People are coming in, wanting to buy vehicles and they're being turned down, just that simple," GM sales analyst Mike DiGiovanni said. "And we have to break and thaw the credit markets for consumers who want to buy automobiles."

Koreans Buck the Trend

Korea's Hyundai Motor Co and its affiliate Kia were the only major brands to escape January's collapse. Hyundai's sales rose 14 percent. Kia gained 3 percent.

Hyundai has been buoyed by a novel promotion that allows Americans to return their new cars if they lose their jobs within a year of purchase.

"It's a very smart program," Edmunds analyst Jesse Toprak said. "People are uncertain about the future and if you give them some security blanket that makes them feel better about the future, about their purchase, it can go a long way."

One of the key questions for the US market this year is whether Ford can make good on its bold bet that it can ride out the downturn with its existing $24 billion of cash.

In part, Ford is holding out hope that the US market will improve in the second half as an expected fiscal stimulus package takes hold and consumer confidence recovers.

To that end, Ford said there were some encouraging signs in January. Showroom sales appear to have stabilized even though sales to rental agencies were down sharply. Used car prices also appear to have stopped falling, executives said.

"What we are looking for at this point is stabilization," said Ford economist Emily Kolinski Morris. "You have to stop falling before you can start rising."

Although the US auto industry is entering its fourth year of declining sales, the deepening slowdown hit European and Asian markets hard in the final months of 2008.

New car sales in Germany, Western Europe's largest auto market, contracted in January at double-digit rates as German consumers tightened their belts in anticipation of the worst recession since World War Two.

 

A Chinese court has delayed the trial of an activist who criticized the government's earthquake response, the man's lawyer said Monday.

Mo Shaoping, who is representing activist Huang Qi, said the postponement came after he protested that the original starting time of Tuesday morning — announced only on Monday — left him less than 24 hours to study the indictment and build a defense against the charge of possessing state secrets.

Mo said the judge has yet to fix the later date.

Earlier Monday, Mo, one of China's best-known human rights lawyers, had said that the sudden announcement of the trial date was illegal and accused the court of "intentionally creating difficulties." According to Mo, rules demand that lawyers be informed of a trial date at least three days in advance.

Telephones at the court in Chengdu, Sichuan's capital, rang unanswered Monday.

Huang had posted articles on his Web site 64Tianwang.com criticizing the government's response to last May 12's magnitude-7.9 temblor after visiting affected areas and meeting parents who lost their children in the collapse of badly built schools.

Public complaints by parents who blamed corruption and shoddy construction for school collapses have since became an extremely sensitive issue.

Human rights groups said Huang was forcibly taken away by three unknown men on June 10 and police informed his mother six days later that he had been detained.

China's Communist leaders often use ill-defined state secrets charges to clamp down on dissent and send activists to prison.

Earlier this decade, Huang, 45, served a five-year prison sentence on subversion charges linked to politically sensitive articles posted on his Web site.

Since his release in 2005, Huang has supported a wide range of causes from aiding families of those killed in the 1989 military crackdown on pro-democracy protests in Beijing, to publicizing the complaints of farmers involved in land disputes with authorities.