Living in China

[Weelock]

Help with Visa question.

I currently have a 1 year tourist visa for China that is expiring in a few months. What is the currently price to get a new tourist visa while in China. The 1 yr tourist visa was giving at a Chinese Embassy in the USA and the cost was $140 USD.

I'm a USA citizen and I know each country is different for prices.

I wonder if it's cheaper to get it in Hong Kong or in Macau.

[Ikksman]

Here in Shanghai, I've only seen one or two blatant ads, but friends in Shenzen and Zhuhai tell me that their look around searches bring up a large proportion of naughty pictures with phone or QQ numbers printed across the photo. These have probably been taken down. The article does mention it happened over six months, so it is an ongoing process.

In Shenzhen, it has been more than 12 months since one could find (discover) numerous obvious Wechat accounts of wgs. Even then, the pimps used to create new accounts as soon as the previous one was deleted by Wechat. They even used to display albums of (false) photos of girls.

Currently, it is very rare to find an obvious ad. The attached screenshot is from one account that was briefly posted earlier this year.

Cheers[Photo(s) deleted by Admin]

EDITOR'S NOTE: The photos originally included with this report were deleted in accordance with the Forum's Photo Guidelines prohibiting the posting of photos containing embedded text. Please read the Forum's Photo Guidelines for further information.

[Fuzimiao]

I use wechat for business and personal with girls I know in China. Do you have any idea how they pick the ones to close? I have have never seen an account where it says right out, "do you want to fuck?" The girls and I will sometimes refer to future or past fun times, IE: bed, hotel, love making, sex, etc. Is this enough to get shut down? Mrclen.

Here in Shanghai, I've only seen one or two blatant ads, but friends in Shenzen and Zhuhai tell me that their look around searches bring up a large proportion of naughty pictures with phone or QQ numbers printed across the photo. These have probably been taken down. The article does mention it happened over six months, so it is an ongoing process.

[MrClen]

Tencent closes 20 million prostitution accounts on WeChat.

By Shen Ke.

June 10,2014, Tuesday.

Online Edition.

China'S Internet giant Tencent has cracked down on about 20 million prostitution-related WeChat accounts in the first half of the year, Xinhua news agency said yesterday.

In an action code named "Thunder Strike," Tencent closed about 20 million accounts that offered prostitution services, and about 30,000 accounts that sold counterfeit products.

I use wechat for business and personal with girls I know in China. Do you have any idea how they pick the ones to close? I have have never seen an account where it says right out, "do you want to fuck?" The girls and I will sometimes refer to future or past fun times, IE: bed, hotel, love making, sex, etc. Is this enough to get shut down? Mrclen.

[Fuzimiao]

Tencent closes 20 million prostitution accounts on WeChat.

By Shen Ke.

June 10,2014, Tuesday.

Online Edition.

China'S Internet giant Tencent has cracked down on about 20 million prostitution-related WeChat accounts in the first half of the year, Xinhua news agency said yesterday.

In an action code named "Thunder Strike," Tencent closed about 20 million accounts that offered prostitution services, and about 30,000 accounts that sold counterfeit products.

[Clandestine782]

http://www.thenanfang.com/blog/new-v...-need-to-know/

New visa policies for foreigners now in effect — what you need to know.

Posted: 09/3/2013 3:43 pm.

Some of the biggest changes to China's visa policy since the 1980s came into effect on Sunday, September 1. The idea behind the changes is apparently to provide more flexibility for foreigners, which is why the number of visa categories has increased from eight to 12.

Furthermore, Shenzhen Daily notes that when China last updated the immigration rules in 1986, there wasn't much consideration that foreigners would move to China and stay forever, let alone bring family along with them. But times have changed.

By the end of 2011, 4.752 foreigners were granted permanent residency in China. This is a minuscule number compared with other countries — and even Hong Kong — yet shows that some laowai really are staying for the longest of hauls. Meanwhile, the number of foreigners entering or leaving China topped 54 million last year, the Shenzhen Daily said. With this kind of traffic, the old visa rules just weren't cutting it.

China Briefing has a good outline of the changes. Among them, three new types of visas are being introduced:

The R Visa — For highly-skilled and in-demand senior executives and high-level talents.

The Q Visa — For overseas Chinese returning for family reunion purposes.

The S Visa — For the families of foreigners who wish to come to China for family reunion purposes.

Below is a list of the other visa categories, from China Briefing:

C Visa.

Applicable to train attendants, air crew members and seamen operating international services, and to their accompanying family members.

D Visa.

Applicable to foreigners who are to reside permanently in China.

F Visa.

Applicable to foreigners who come to China for exchanges, visits and inspections.

G Visa.

Applicable to foreigners who transit through China.

J Visa.

J-1 Visa: Applicable to resident foreign journalists in China (long term stay – more than 180 days)

J-2 Visa: Applicable to foreign journalists who make short trips to China for reporting tasks (short term stay – less than or equal to 180 days)

L Visa.

Applicable to overseas tourists (those traveling with tour groups can be issued a group L Visa)

M Visa.

Applicable to foreigners who come to China for business or commercial activities.

Q Visa.

Q-1 Visa: Applicable to foreigners who apply for entry into China for family reunification with Chinese relatives or foreigners with permanent residency in China, as well as to those who need to visit China for adoption issues (long term stay – more than 180 days)

Q-2 Visa: Applicable to foreigners who come to China for a temporary visit to Chinese citizens or foreigners with permanent residency in China (short term stay – less than or equal to 180 days)

R Visa.

Applicable to senior-level foreign talents and foreign nationals whose special skills are urgently needed in China.

S Visa.

S-1 Visa: Applicable to spouses, parents, parents-in-law and children under 18 years old of foreigners who stay in China for study or working purposes, and to foreigners who need to reside in China for other personal reasons (long term stay – more than 180 days)

S-2 Visa: Applicable to family members of foreigners who stay in China for study or working purposes, and to foreigners who need to reside in China for other personal reasons (short term stay – less than or equal to 180 days)

X Visa.

X-1 visa is applicable to foreigners who come to China for a long-term study period (more than 180 days)

X-2 visa is applicable to foreigners who come to China for a short-term study period (less than or equal to 180 days)

Z Visa.

Applicable to foreigners who apply to work in China.

As usual, we're quite lucky in this part of the world. Many laowai stationed in more far-flung regions of the country must buy air tickets and fly to Korea, Russia, Japan, or Hong Kong on visa runs. We have the convenience of just popping across the border.

Whichever visa you qualify for, just make sure it's updated and valid.

[SE Asia Joe]

http://www.scmp.com/news/china/artic...net-regulation

people's daily editorials signal harsher internet regulation.

amy li.

bio.

after graduating from the university of missouri with a master's degree in journalism, amy li began her journalism career as a crime news reporter in queens, new york, in 2004. she joined reuters in beijing in 2008 as a multimedia editor. amy taught journalism at southwestern university of finance and economics in chengdu and started an environment blog, green bullet, before joining scmp in hong kong. she is now an online news editor for scmp. com. amy can be reached at chunxiao.li@scmp.com.

chinese communist party mouthpiece the people's daily meted out harshly worded front-page editorials about internet regulation on friday, thursday and tuesday this week, a move that might signal the party's new campaign to impose further controls on the nation's already heavily censored internet, especially its booming social media community.

in friday's editorial titled 'the internet is safer and more convenient under regulation', the author maintained that 'rumours' and "slanders' like the doomsday tale will cause harm to individuals, society and the country.

'it is the civilians' wish that the chaotic internet be regulated, ' said the editorial.

the editorial further argued that internet regulation will not compromise freedom of speech. instead, it will stimulate civilized communication, promote online business and guarantee a safer environment.

the editorial arrived at the conclusion that 'our life online will be more convenient once our internet management is more scientific, effective and standard. '

in thursday's editorial titled 'internet needs to operate under law', the author claimed: 'while the us drafted computer system laws in 1977, japan has adopted indirect real-name system, and germany also blocks illegal websites. '

another heavy-weight mouthpiece the guangming daily, published by the publicity department of the ccp central committee, ran a front-page editorial on friday titled 'experts call for internet regulation for a healthy and orderly environment'.

on china's micro-blogging service sina weibo, the people's daily's editorial drew angry responses from netizens.

'regulating rumours? but who are the biggest rumour makers in china? ' said one weibo user.

'talking about rule of law, what happened to our constitutional rights of free speech and demonstration? ' said another weibo user.

china's internet is heavily censored by the government. internet users rely on vpns, or virtual private networks, to circumvent firewalls in order to use websites including facebook and twitter.

the chinese government has also blocked access to both the english-language and chinese-language websites of the new york times after it published an investigative report on premier wen jiabao's family wealth in october.

[SE Asia Joe]

http://www.scmp.com/news/china/artic...law?1356599701

seaj.

china's bloggers must use real names under proposed law.

web users say contentious proposal is another attempt to curb freedom of speech and will scare those seeking to expose corrupt officials.

thursday. 27 december. 2012, 12:00am.

mandy zuo mandy.zuo@scmp.com

many internet users say the proposed law is an attempt to further curb freedom of speech. photo: afp.

new legislation governing the internet, which officials claim is aimed at combating online vigilantes and privacy breaches, is proving controversial on the mainland because it will require bloggers and bulletin board users to register using their real names.

many internet users say it is an attempt to further curb freedom of speech and have expressed concern that it could scare off many wanting to expose corrupt officials.

a draft proposal to "strengthen protection of internet information ", discussed at a national people's congress standing committee meeting on monday, would oblige internet service providers to protect personal information and restrict the sending of spam text messages and e-mails.

li fei, deputy director of the npc's legislative affairs committee, told the meeting that because of "difficulty in getting evidence and punishing the right person" in cases of online crimes,"it's necessary to strengthen regulation of the identity of internet users", state media reported.

he was quoted as saying that people would be legally required to register with their real names when they signed up for platforms that released information, such as blogs, microblogs and bulletin board services. such platforms have become a major source of anti-corruption exposés recently.

microblog users were told to register their real identities by march this year in a bid to curb "rumours and vulgarity", but that was a directive rather than a law.

official propaganda on the legislation has focused on online frauds and harassing phone calls, but more people are concerned about the basic human right of information freedom.

the proposal will became law if passed by the npc standing committee. the whole text was not released after monday's discussion.

hua lijia, a prosecutor in huhehot, inner mongolia, said public supervision of government would be affected if the proposal was adopted.

"many ordinary people are not good at fighting or cannot bear revenge, so they have to protect themselves first," he said.

duan xingyan, a policeman in jiujiang, jiangxi, said that if people circulated rumours online, it was already possible to trace them.

"but if you register with your real name and someone steals your account and spreads a rumour in your name, undeserved punishment could happen", he wrote on his microblog.

professor shen kui, from peking university's law school, questioned the legal reasoning behind the proposal.

he said that it was not technically necessary, since the police could already bust online crimes without requiring real name registration, for example, via a user's ip address, while it could frighten off many potential whistleblowers.

"when the negative social influence goes beyond the cost of busting crimes, the reasoning of this legislation is insufficient," shen said.

[Clandestine782]

The most important showdown between China and the United States isn't happening in the Pacific. It's happening at the SEC.

BY PATRICK CHOVANEC | DECEMBER 10, 2012 http://chovanec.wordpress.com/

China and the United States are on a collision course — over accounting. Last week, the USA Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) charged the Chinese affiliates of the world's top five accounting firms with violating securities laws for refusing to hand over information on suspect Chinese companies to investigators. The move is the latest, most dramatic step in an escalating standoff that could easily lead to a financial version of Armageddon: the forcible (and unprecedented) delisting of all Chinese shares currently traded on USA exchanges, including big-name stocks like Baidu, Sinopec, and China Mobile — causing losses of billions of dollars and damaging the perception that the United States is friendly to Chinese businesses.

Accounting audit practices may seem like a topic more likely to lull nations (and magazine readers) to sleep. But as anyone who lost money investing in Enron or with Bernie Madoff knows, playing fast and loose with accounting rules can have huge consequences. Accounting is the language of business, and lying about revenues or liabilities is fraud. Washington created the SEC in the wake of the Wall Street Crash of 1929 to ensure that companies that offer their shares to the public are what they claim to be.

To meet that objective, the SEC requires that all companies selling securities to the public to submit annual financial statements audited by a qualified third party. If a company doesn't file reports that have an auditor's stamp of approval, its stocks and bonds cannot be traded on a public exchange. After the scandal following the 2001 collapse of energy giant Enron, in which the company's auditor, Arthur Andersen, faced criminal charges for covering up dodgy accounting practices, Congress passed the Sarbanes-Oxley Act to tighten up regulation of auditors and the audit process. The new law created the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) , a quasi-public entity that reports to the SEC and is responsible for policing the auditors. Now, in order to perform qualified audits, an audit firm must register with the board and submit to rigorous and regular inspections by its staff.

Over the past decade, roughly 400 Chinese companies have listed their shares on USA stock exchanges. A few are multi-billion dollar state-owned enterprises, such as China Life, China Telecom, and PetroChina. More than 100 were so-called backdoor-listed companies that circumvented the cost and scrutiny associated with an initial public offering by buying and merging into a USA firm whose stock was already listed. As USA-listed stocks, all of them have chosen to submit themselves to SEC regulation in order to tap USA and global investors for funds via USA markets.

Because the bulk of their operations are in China, these companies must rely on auditors licensed in China — in many cases the Chinese subsidiaries of the top global audit firms — to audit them. For the SEC to accept their audits, these China-based auditors must register and maintain good standing with the board.

The problem is that the Chinese regulator, the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) , refuses to allow the board to inspect the USA-registered, China-based auditors, as required by Sarbanes-Oxley. It sees the idea of a USA regulator overseeing a Chinese auditor as a violation of China's national sovereignty. For some time now, the board has been negotiating with the CSRC, trying to get them to accept some form of cooperative inspections, or even allow it to observe Chinese inspections. So far, these talks have gone nowhere.

It's not unusual for the United States to get pushback from foreign countries or foreign companies on new regulations. When Sarbanes-Oxley first passed, several USA-listed European firms (as well as many USA companies) objected to a provision requiring listed firms to perform an annual audit of internal controls, in addition to the traditional audit of financial statements. They argued that this extra requirement was so costly and burdensome, they might no longer bother to maintain their stock listings in the United States, seriously undermining the position of the USA capital markets on the world stage. In response, the SEC temporarily suspended the rule for foreign companies, and eventually scaled down the requirement for all companies to a less onerous 'top-down review. '

Recent events, however, have made it a lot harder for the SEC to show similar flexibility toward China. Since 2010, a number of short-sellers researching in China have leveled high-profile accusations of fraud against Chinese firms listed on USA markets. Five companies targeted by Muddy Waters, the best-known of those short-sellers, lost almost $5 billion in market value through June 2011. Several others have seen their shares rendered nearly worthless or been forced to declare bankruptcy. These firms allegedly engaged in malfeasance ranging from questionable accounting practices to inflate revenues and profits, making up numbers out of thin air (and hoping no one has the resources to prove otherwise) , embezzling funds, and even being total shams.

The SEC has also raised concerns about a popular holding structure, called the Variable Interest Entity, that many USA-listed 'China stocks' use to operate in certain industries in China, such as media and education, where foreign ownership is prohibited. The USA-listed company exercises operational and financial 'control' via contracts, allowing it to claim the China business as its own. Virtually all Chinese Internet start-ups listed in the United States are structured this way. The SEC worries that Chinese authorities could someday invalidate the contracts as illegal, leaving USA investors holding completely worthless shares.

In response, the SEC has launched fraud investigations into several USA-listed Chinese companies and their executives, ordering their China-based auditors to hand over confidential documents to examine for potential evidence of wrongdoing. In the most visible case, the SEC in May 2011 handed lawyers for Deloitte China a federal court subpoena to turn over its audit work papers for Longtop Financial Technologies, a Hong Kong-based maker of financial software that short-seller Citron Research had accused of fraudulent accounting (prompting Deloitte to resign the account, citing 'recently identified falsity' in Longtop's financial statements).

Deloitte China fired its lawyer for accepting the subpoena, and refused to comply. In a court filing explaining why, Deloitte claimed that Chinese regulators had issued an extraordinary threat, telling auditors that handing over audit work papers would violate China's (vague and draconian) State Secrets law, allowing China to 'dissolve the firm entirely and to seek prison sentences up to life in prison for any [Deloitte] partners and employees who participated in the violation. '

The refusals come at a time when Chinese local authorities, embarrassed by the allegations, have been cracking down on short-sellers' researchers, shutting off access to company disclosure filings and sometimes harassing and even jailing research teams conducting due diligence within China. The SEC, for its part, asked the judge in the Deloitte case for a stay until this coming January, to see if it could work out some kind of solution with its counterparts at the CSRC.

Last week's decision to file charges against all five top global audit firms in China appears to signal an end to the SEC's patience. In its court filing, the SEC expressed frustration, noting that since 2009, the CSRC had refused to provide any meaningful assistance on 21 information requests arising from 16 securities investigations into USA-listed Chinese firms. The Chinese, it has concluded, are simply stonewalling.

While the details may seem arcane, the ramifications can hardly be overstated. Chinese auditors could face financial penalties, but they could also be disqualified from conducting SEC audits. If Chinese auditors get de-registered, USA-listed Chinese companies won't be able to find anyone to sign off on their audits, leading all of these firms to have their shares forcibly delisted, en masse, from USA markets. Shareholders would still own their shares, but those shares would be much harder to buy and sell, making them worth considerably less.

Some domestic players think China has outgrown its need to rely on USA capital markets. State-owned China Development Bank has put together a $1 billion war chest to help buy out USA-listed Chinese companies and take them private. Rather than caving in, their defenders argue, Chinese companies should come home and relist on domestic or Hong Kong stock exchanges, where they might command even higher valuations. Given that China's Shanghai Index is down two-thirds from its peak five years ago, and with Hong Kong regulators raising similar concerns about fraud, this path may not be as easy or as promising as it sounds.

Chinese companies won't be the only ones affected if SEC-qualified Chinese auditors go the way of the dodo. Plenty of multinationals listed on USA markets, many of them headquartered in the United States, have substantial parts of their business in China. Yum Brands takes in 44 percent of its revenues from the KFC and Pizza Hut outlets it has in China. Car sales in China account for 34 percent of General Motors' profits. These numbers matter to their global bottom lines, and to sign off on their SEC filings, their lead auditors in the United States need a PBAOC-registered Chinese auditor to vouch for them. If no such auditors exist, these companies have a problem. (There may be clever workarounds, such as dividing up the work among so many auditors that none of them is vouching for a 'substantial' part of the business, but it's a costly and cumbersome solution. Nor is it clear if easy loopholes can be created for multinationals with substantial China operations without tearing a big hole in the fabric of USA securities regulation).

The SEC, though, may feel it has no other option. China's constraints effectively place Chinese companies completely beyond the reach of USA securities laws. If this were just a theoretical concern, there might be room to maneuver. But with dozens of Chinese stocks traded on USA exchanges dragged down by fraud allegations, costing investors billions of dollars in losses, the SEC has to act. And each action it takes brings the United States and China one step closer to an ugly financial divorce.

[El Frances]

Hi,

Do anyone know a reliable shop in Beijing, where I can buy these new Chinese Android 4 tablets, but in English version (and preferably with Google play)? They are sold on the web, but I don't know if they are also sold in shops.

Thanks!

[Gualtier Malde]

Wow! When you did a business, surely it was something simple like a restaurant (things which exist in abundance in China). These things that are being talked about here are BIG things. Can that many receipts be faked?

Well, on second thought. I guess they could. If you have a restaurant, it is something like a thousand receipts a week of 50RMB each. But if you have a big business, then it is only a matter of adding a zero here or a one there and then your results are what you want them to be.

I have wondered if the Chinese government does the US / foreign companies a favor by not allowing them to list here. Something like 99% of companies that try to do business here lose money. So, if bigger companies came and tried to list on the stock market, that would just be more companies that had a chance to come and lose money.

Give me some examples of where the money disappears to. Some examples of situations that you have seen / lived.

No it wasn't a restaurant! I would be happy to share via PM.

GM.

[Sintrav]

I doubt very much that someone speaking no english (nor spanish) would get a CPA license in the USA. If you can't write the tests. Does not preclude you from working though. Accounting is not just about adding up the numbers. I also doubt that any Fortune 500 company in the US would accept that the partner in charge of their account could not speak any english except hello. Makes sense to me.

Accounting is not just about adding up the numbers. Absolutely right. I think you see the picture.

Each country so to say has it's own rules and guidelines when it comes to accounting. Thats why you are looking for (need) a local certified book keeper. Head accountant of a big international comp may not speak a single word of Chinese. He can keep the books to his companies standards but this does not mean a Chinese version of the books is not required. Like to see an expat doing that. He might even sign the balance sheets but again, without local help. No way.

In the end it is all numbers which have to match, but its a long way to this point (in China too)

Looking into accounting here in China myself soon (why I never trust these guys)?

[Loveasiangirls]

Language skills are incidental. The point is seeing if the numbers add up. (They likely don't.) In any case, differing language has not been an issue in other countries. Why should it be an issue in China? (No one has ever complained about German being spoken in Switzerland and therefore records of their companies being inaccessible.)

I doubt very much that someone speaking no english (nor spanish) would get a CPA license in the USA. If you can't write the tests. Does not preclude you from working though. Accounting is not just about adding up the numbers. I also doubt that any Fortune 500 company in the US would accept that the partner in charge of their account could not speak any english except hello. Makes sense to me.

[Clandestine782]

Wow! When you did a business, surely it was something simple like a restaurant (things which exist in abundance in China). These things that are being talked about here are BIG things. Can that many receipts be faked?

Well, on second thought. I guess they could. If you have a restaurant, it is something like a thousand receipts a week of 50RMB each. But if you have a big business, then it is only a matter of adding a zero here or a one there and then your results are what you want them to be.

I have wondered if the Chinese government does the US / foreign companies a favor by not allowing them to list here. Something like 99% of companies that try to do business here lose money. So, if bigger companies came and tried to list on the stock market, that would just be more companies that had a chance to come and lose money.

Give me some examples of where the money disappears to. Some examples of situations that you have seen / lived.

[Gualtier Malde]

language skills are incidental. the point is seeing if the numbers add up. (they likely don't.) in any case, differing language has not been an issue in other countries. why should it be an issue in china? (no one has ever complained about german being spoken in switzerland and therefore records of their companies being inaccessible.)

and unfortunately, the numbers will add up, as i learned in my first locally managed chinese business. yet, even with magically balanced books, the money will disappear. one has to look beyond the books at receipts, which will be forged / copied / mutilated / lost / altered / obfurep001ed as necessary to justify the figures entered into the books. only an outside audit by an independent, western trained, chinese speaking accountant has a hope of finding this kind of fraud, and even then you won't have real certainty.

gm.