:00:00. > :00:00.route from Mumbai to the northern city of Dehradun when the fire
:00:00. > :00:00.struck, filling three carriages with suffocating smoke. Those are the
:00:00. > :00:00.latest headlines from BBC World News. Now for the latest financial
:00:00. > :00:25.news in World Business Report. An uphill struggle as economists
:00:26. > :00:28.around the world say it is time to sell Chinese assets. China fights
:00:29. > :00:30.back with tougher regulations and measures to improve the accuracy of
:00:31. > :00:33.its economic data. Launching the next big thing. In Las
:00:34. > :00:36.Vegas, the boss of Sony explains why profit increases might slow but new
:00:37. > :00:47.innovations are still coming thick and fast.
:00:48. > :00:52.Welcome to World Business Report. I'm Sally Bundock. Also in the
:00:53. > :01:05.programme, China lifts a ban on games consoles and Nintendo shares
:01:06. > :01:08.soar. We'll have the details. Doom and gloom seems to be the
:01:09. > :01:10.overriding message for the emerging markets this year. As leading
:01:11. > :01:13.economists at the world's biggest banks release their 2014 forecasts,
:01:14. > :01:17.the key message is it's time for investors to cut their exposure to
:01:18. > :01:22.emerging markets. China's growing debt mountain is cited as one of the
:01:23. > :01:25.key concerns. Fears that China's growth rate is falling sharper than
:01:26. > :01:30.official figures reveal is also a worry. So in an attempt to reassure
:01:31. > :01:33.investors, China's chief statistician said his country will
:01:34. > :01:38.improve the quality of its economic data. And regulators are reportedly
:01:39. > :01:47.going to clamp down on the country's relaxed lending system. But is this
:01:48. > :01:50.too little, too late? Have investors already lost confidence in the
:01:51. > :01:52.country? That's a question for the BBC's
:01:53. > :02:00.Chief Business Correspondent Linda Yueh. She joins me now from
:02:01. > :02:07.Singapore. Nice to see you. Are we right to be concerned about China's
:02:08. > :02:15.outlook in the year ahead? Have the economists the right advice? Think
:02:16. > :02:20.there is cause for concern. One of the concerned is whether the debt
:02:21. > :02:25.burden makes China less sustainable. That is one reason why they have
:02:26. > :02:31.ordered an audit. It is the first since 2010. It shows that local
:02:32. > :02:35.government debt and, Sally, China is the second-biggest economy but it is
:02:36. > :02:39.still less than half the size of the US. Local government debt in China
:02:40. > :02:44.is approximately the same size as municipal debt in the US. With a big
:02:45. > :02:49.debt burden and worries over the accuracy of the measurement of GDP
:02:50. > :02:54.because it is always the debt to GDP ratio that investors look out, this
:02:55. > :02:58.is a key reason why China's debt issue has become a problem that
:02:59. > :03:03.weighs on global investors' minds again. These news from the chief
:03:04. > :03:07.statistician saying that we will make sure that our data is reliable,
:03:08. > :03:13.is that going to help us? Will that be effective in terms of investors
:03:14. > :03:22.overseas thing in China is a safer bet? I think that he will have a
:03:23. > :03:26.pretty tough hill to climb. This is not the first attempt that the
:03:27. > :03:30.Chinese National bureau of statistics has made to try to
:03:31. > :03:33.improve the precision of their statistics. One of the biggest
:03:34. > :03:38.discrepancy is that we have seen is that if you take the national
:03:39. > :03:42.estimate of GDP and compare that to the report, there is at least a 10%
:03:43. > :03:49.difference in terms of size of the economy and that is a huge
:03:50. > :03:53.discrepancy. If you think about debt burden, if you can't get that right,
:03:54. > :04:00.that is a key issue. The other thing to say is that this is a ongoing
:04:01. > :04:06.effort. It is an effort to stop local authorities from falsifying
:04:07. > :04:11.darter. It is also an attempt by the Chinese authorities to measure what
:04:12. > :04:16.hasn't been measured. -- data. A lot of rural activity is not measured.
:04:17. > :04:21.The grey in formal economy is a big part of China. I would not always
:04:22. > :04:29.think of them inaccuracy as an under measurement. Sometimes, it is under
:04:30. > :04:34.measured. Sometimes you have to say that you will do something but it is
:04:35. > :04:40.another thing to see how they will do it. Briefly, there are moves to
:04:41. > :04:45.curb excessive risky lending. Will that work as well? That will be
:04:46. > :04:51.tough. There are ways they are trying to do it. One is to rein back
:04:52. > :04:56.world of management products. Dodgy products which remind you of
:04:57. > :05:00.sub-prime mortgages. They will try to clamp down on that. That is part
:05:01. > :05:04.of the shadow banking system. Another part of that will be hard to
:05:05. > :05:09.clamp down on it how local is borrow. There is a big attempt to
:05:10. > :05:13.allow local governments to borrow on bond markets and that will take some
:05:14. > :05:18.time. Those are the two main ways in which China will try to clean up its
:05:19. > :05:23.debt system. It is probably the case that at the moment, the overhang of
:05:24. > :05:27.debt in China is going to be one of the biggest worries of investors
:05:28. > :05:32.going into 2014. Both of those cleanups will take some time. Thank
:05:33. > :05:37.you very much. That was an analysis of what is happening in China. This
:05:38. > :05:42.news has come through in the last few days affecting the market.
:05:43. > :05:45.Now for some of the latest news from the consumer electronics show in
:05:46. > :05:47.Vegas. Amazon is teaming up with Samsung to popularize ultra
:05:48. > :05:49.high-definition television. Intel has launched its new personal
:05:50. > :05:54.assistant, dubbed 'Jarvis', its answer to Apple's voice-activated
:05:55. > :05:59.Siri. And Sony has launched its latest PlayStation. So what exactly
:06:00. > :06:01.is the shape of things to come for these tech giants? Technology
:06:02. > :06:02.correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones caught up with Sony's chief
:06:03. > :06:14.executive, Kazuo Hirai. A tabletop screen showing live
:06:15. > :06:20.television, my calendar, post- it notes, all on the kitchen table. It
:06:21. > :06:24.is just a concept at the moment. In Las Vegas, Sony has been unveiling
:06:25. > :06:29.and entire range of products. I have been speaking to the President about
:06:30. > :06:34.where the firm is heading. Wearable technology is huge here. You have
:06:35. > :06:39.launched something new. Tellers about it. Iron wearing the
:06:40. > :06:46.wristband. Inside the wristband, if I can find it, is the call. -- I'm
:06:47. > :06:52.wearing the wristband. It goes in here. It logs all your activities,
:06:53. > :06:56.walking, in the car, on a bicycle. All the physical activities which
:06:57. > :07:00.you do. It allows you to basically blog photos you have taken, what
:07:01. > :07:07.music you listen to and everything you do in a day. The big battle in
:07:08. > :07:10.recent months has been gaming consoles. The Sony PlayStation 4 is
:07:11. > :07:15.seen as a great gaming machine that the Xbox One, is leading in terms of
:07:16. > :07:20.an entertainment, so how do you think the battle is going? We sold
:07:21. > :07:25.4.2 million units which is a very high number in deed. Will you call
:07:26. > :07:33.victory then in the battle? I have always said that the console
:07:34. > :07:37.business is a 5-10 year proposition. The disappointment a few years back
:07:38. > :07:42.with the unexpected profit warning. That must have been a big
:07:43. > :07:46.disappointment. If you look at it from a quarterly perspective, it was
:07:47. > :07:50.a disappointment but again, one quarter does not make an entire
:07:51. > :07:53.business. At the same time, every quarter matters so we have to make
:07:54. > :07:58.sure that we have the best products, that we do the most efficient
:07:59. > :08:02.business. There are some things we cannot control like the exchange
:08:03. > :08:06.rate for example but we need to make sure that the business is robust
:08:07. > :08:14.enough that we can afford to absorb differences in exchange rates. There
:08:15. > :08:20.will need to be tough decision. No Mac we have tried to do that many
:08:21. > :08:23.times. Some businesses are growing. Some will have more employees and
:08:24. > :08:27.other businesses where it shrinks, we will restructure. That is the
:08:28. > :08:31.part of business. It is not something we do one day, that is an
:08:32. > :08:38.ongoing process. That was the boss of Sony speaking
:08:39. > :08:42.to our correspondant who is at CES. Other correspondence are there. We
:08:43. > :08:48.have a teen death for the BBC. This is our technology page on the
:08:49. > :08:55.website. Do take a look. You can follow our team on Twitter as well.
:08:56. > :08:58.In other news: Chinese authorities are set to lift a ban on games
:08:59. > :09:01.consoles. The move will boost companies such as Ninetendo. Sony
:09:02. > :09:06.and Nintendo shares rose by more than 6% on the news. In 2000,
:09:07. > :09:09.Chinese authorities banned consoles such as the Wii U and Sony's
:09:10. > :09:13.PlayStation to protect youths from the perceived corrupting influence
:09:14. > :09:16.of video games. The US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew
:09:17. > :09:18.meets German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schauble in Berlin before
:09:19. > :09:23.travelling on and meeting Portuguese Prime Minister Pedro Passos Coelho
:09:24. > :09:26.in Lisbon. In Germany, Lew will press the idea of more support for
:09:27. > :09:29.crisis countries like Greece, Portugal and Spain, urging them to
:09:30. > :09:30.pursue reforms while supporting their return to growth with stronger
:09:31. > :09:48.demand inside Germany. The markets today, Japan is standing
:09:49. > :09:51.out yet again. It is up 1.53%. A lot is to do with the currency. It is
:09:52. > :09:56.weakening against other currencies except for the Canadian dollar.
:09:57. > :10:03.Japanese companies are set to gain quite significant money it is the
:10:04. > :10:11.trend. Hong Kong is up as well but you can that the yen is down. Those
:10:12. > :10:13.are the events of the day there. I'll see you soon as we talk through
:10:14. > :10:27.the papers. Voters should have to show ID at
:10:28. > :10:30.polling stations, like they do in Northern Ireland, in an attempt to
:10:31. > :10:32.stamp out vote-rigging, according to the Elections watchdog.