07/12/2017 Asia Business Report

Theresa May is planning to come up

with a new formula to find a way

forward in the stalled Brexit

negotiations in the next 24 hours.

Voters in Nepal are casting their

vote as they look to and use of

vote as they look to and use of

poverty and political instability.

Meet the designer for Apple who

created the most profitable real

space in the world. Good morning,

Asia, hello, world. Glad you could

join us for another exciting Asia

Business Report. The polls have

opened and voters are casting their

ballots in at election in Nepal. In

the last three decades, they have

suffered an earthquake and political

instability including an 10-year

violent insurgency. We report from

the capital, Kathmandu. The election

are described as a watershed moment

what this country. It witnessed a

10-year insurgency which ended in

2006 and then the monarchy was

abolished two years later. It took

ten years for the politicians to

agree on a constitution, that was

last year, and that is why this

election is important. The first

after they have adopted a new

constitution. In this election, the

Congress is taking on a coalition.

First of all, they have the best

infrastructure and create more jobs.

The country witnessed a devastating

earthquake in 2015 - that had a

negative impact on the economy. One

of the priorities will be what to do

with China initiative. Nepal

approved in principle which aims to

boost productivity in Asia and the

Pacific region. The idea is to build

a road from their all the way to

Kathmandu. Politicians here hope by

investing millions of dollars with

Chinese help, it will help to boost

the economic road in this country.

The International Monetary Fund has

published its most recent report,

looking at the stability of China's

financial system which has fine at

short debt. -- financial debt. In

order to meet targets and avoid

heavy job losses, I spoke to

business consultant. I asked him how

concerned we should be about the

debt problem? Not terribly

concerned. The IMF sounded the

warning is several times over the

past couple of years looking at the

debt rising from two up to 300% by

2022. China has been actively

addressing that debt, whether it is

controls are round lending, looking

at the bigger pic is in investments

going overseas, in addition,

continuing the growth path so that

it continues to outpace the level of

debt. From its overall path and GDP,

it is only around a thousand per

person yet, in comparison to around

the world it is low. China has a

long way to go. They have a massive

debt but even though it is their it

also needs to look at the assets.

China has a great potential out

there. As a management consulting

firm we look at some of the risks.

Where you see increased in interest

rates, whether you see impact on

trade and potential disruption. As

China looks at investment, you are

looking at pushback from countries

and regions like the EU. Whether it

is Robotics. In the US you are

seeing it in high-tech sectors. That

could constrain the growth and could

pose additional challenges of China

in the future.

As Brexit talks

continue, many businesses are

readjusting. We asked one how the

shift in political and economic ties

are impacting the multinational

bank.

So much of our business is

outside of Europe. It is an

expensive inconvenience on the

margins. We are a bit clearer of

euros meaning that once companies

have settled their accounts in euros

we facilitate that and we do that

from a branch in Frankfurt and we

need to convert that to subsidiary

and that will have to have fresh

capital and have to be licensed by

the regulator in Germany.

Bill

Winters, the CEO of Standard

Chartered bank. Which company has

the most profitable retail space in

the world? It is Apple. $5,500 per

square foot beating Harrods and

Tiffany 's. When the first one

opened, it was actually considered

risky move. It is argued they could

not possibly make money by the late

Steve Jobs was convinced they would

be successful and, of course, the

rest is history. The man who

designed the store is now based in

Singapore and we caught up with

We started in 1987 when Steve Jobs

came back to the company. He asked

us to think about how to present

Apple in various public realms. My

business partner and myself started

on the whiteboard. We met with him

every week for 12 years and grew the

programme through a number of

processes and helped to be a part of

that transformation from what was a

relatively small company. It was

$2.2 billion in value and now it is

750 plus. Apple develop much more

significant differentiator products

at that time. What has happened in

the industry is it has become...

Strong revolutionary brands out

there. We can see over a number of

years our progression from the

ambition to copy and emulate other

solutions to leapfrog those and

become leaders. We seem that Rao and

grow in Asia. It started to reflect

to me what silicon valley seem to

feel like, a genuine interest in

creating something great. It is a

simple food service system that

allows people to have much higher

quality food, still quickly, and be

integrated with the way they work.

One of the things that keep you in

design is that the feeling you get

when you see something that started

out as a sketch to people being

happy and enjoying what they are

doing. Bitcoin has set yet another

record high, breaking through the

$50,000 barrier. It was another

milestone for the currency which has

increased dramatically over the last

year.

Timothy McDonald, last week it

was 10,000...

Now it is 14,000.

Since talking it has broken.

Shocking! It is just incredible.

This time last year it was $1000 and

since then it has broken through

barrier after barrier to the point

we are just sick of writing about

the... It is sounding like a broken

record. When a value increases that

dramatically, you are a little bit

worried about what is over the next

ridge. A lot of worry about whether

this could be a bubble but the thing

is that nobody really knows and

people have a very hard time

particular eating why it is worth

this much. A lot of people have a

hard time defining what Bitcoin

actually is. Really, it could be a

bubble, it could be anybody's guess.

We do not know what is going to

happen to Bitcoin. Let's have a

quick look at the markets and

currently