The COVID-19 infection rate is getting out of control in Singapore, Taiwan and Vietnam.

Indian variant B.1.617 seems a lot more transmissible, can also infect vaccinated individuals and can also lead to symptomatic infections among children.

New lockdowns in Singapore and Taiwan led their stock markets into a tailspin. Transport stocks and banks suffered while grocery stocks rallied.

Chinese housing prices grew at the fastest pace in eight months at 0.48% MoM, compared to 0.41% MoM as speculators try to hedge themselves against rising global inflation.

The Hong Kong government has unveiled a REIT subsidy plan to compete with Singapore’s and Japan’s REIT markets.

Commodity prices are starting to fall back to earth, and many are asking themselves whether it’s driven by a peak in China’s credit cycle. Or is China’s stockpiling of commodities decelerating?

Company-specific reports

• I did a deep-dive on Malaysian palm oil company United Plantations (KLSE:UPL — US$1.4 billion) ($)

• The Value Investing Substack on Malaysian oil company Hibiscus Petroleum Berhad (KLSE:HIBISCS — US$318 million)

• Wickhams Hill Capital on Steel Pipe Industry Industry of Indonesia (IDX:ISSP — US$137 million)

• NipponNuggets on high-flying Japanese enterprise software stock V-Cube (KLSE:HIBISCS — US$604 million)

• Undervalued Japan on Fukuda Denshi (JASDAQ:6960 — US$604 million)

• Pembridgecap gives a bullish account of Nintendo (TSE:7974 — US$67 billion)

• Blue Orca Capital claims So-Young International (NASDAQ:SY — US$541 million) is faking its accounts

Long-form writing

• I wrote a post about how East Asian countries developed and what it might imply for stock selection

• I wrote another post about insider buying trends across Asia: what countries, what sectors and what companies are seeing the most insider buying ($)

• Discussion on Southeast Asian entrepreneurship in Hayden Capital’s 1Q21 letter

• Open Insights is not convinced that inflation is transitory

• Glenn Chan makes the case that vaccinations might not solve COVID-19

• Financial Times: Tether is backed by only 2.9% reserves

• Chinese state media makes a 180 turn and becomes positive about Tesla

• Sign of the times: hottest job for young Chinese is to become civil servants

• American Chamber of Commerce says US companies in China are being discriminated against

• Hong Kong’s government freezes opposition leader Jimmy Lai’s assets

• 40% of expats in AmCham survey respondents say they will leave Hong Kong

• Nikkei on South Korea’s booming IPO market

• The story of the failure of Philippines first unicorn company Revolution

Podcasts and videos

• Asia Matter podcast on Biden’s first 100 days (48 mins)

• China Tech Investors on China’s nascent semiconductor industry (1:06 hours)

• The Economist Radio on China’s population census (23 mins)

• The Little Red Podcast discussing China’s global propaganda push (52 mins)

• Poly Matter discusses China’s Wolf Warrior Diplomacy (19 mins)

• Arjun Murti painting a realistic picture of the renewables industry (1:06 hours)

• Jeffrey Gundlach is worried about inflation (19 mins)

• Dan Sundheim at Sohn 2021 (37 mins)

• Bill Ackman interviewed by the Wall Street Journal (30 mins)

• Stanley Druckenmiller is bearish on the US Dollar (11 mins)

Chart of the week – Tech ETF market share has started to drop

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Thanks for reading, and I wish you a great week ahead!