RWR Advisory Group

Specializing in the risks present at the intersection of global business & national security. Now a part of @JanesINTEL.

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

RWR is excited to announce we’re joining Janes, providers of assured OSINT. In Janes we found a partner who can take our coverage of economic & financial statecraft to the next level. Together we will deliver the world’s most comprehensive foundational intelligence capability.

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

In this @NikkeiAsia article published today, @heguisen speaks with Janes senior analyst @ClaireJChu about COSCO Shipping and China's dominance in the commercial maritime sector.

[Chris Horton 何貴森 @heguisen]

China's COSCO Shipping, the world's 4th-largest shipping group, operates 400+ container ships at 500+ ports worldwide. Controlled by the Chinese Communist Party, it also supports and conducts exercises with the PLA Navy. It receives very little scrutiny.
https://t.co/vtTi1arSbK

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

Yahua has pursued other lithium transactions as well, including many with Australian firms. In February, Yahua acquired a 3.4% stake in Abyssinian Metals, and in December, Yahua aquired a 9.5% stake in Australia's EV Resources.

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

This new deal means that Chinese entities now have partnership stakes in virtually all of Ultra Lithium’s key lithium assets. (In Feb, China's Zangge Mining signed a cooperation agreement with Ultra Lithium to develop its Argentinian assets in Catamarca.) https://t.co/ooWDwlUI1F

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

The deal includes a 60% share of a subsidiary of Ultra Lithium that has lithium assets in two Ontario lakes. Yahua reportedly intends to build a lithium concentrate mining and processing plant serving the two Ontario projects.

https://t.co/2Q2zUQszJI

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

This week, reports indicated that a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sichuan Yahua Industrial Group Co., Ltd., which operates in the lithium and civil explosive sectors, will buy a 13.2% stake of Ultra Lithium Inc., a Canadian lithium and gold mining company, for $4 million.

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

@owenschurchill @SCMPNews @JanesINTEL “Regardless of the outcome of the war, it seems likely that Chinese companies that already had a presence in Ukraine would directly transmit humanitarian assistance to affected communities,” said Courtney Hulse, an analyst at Janes. @theincrdblhulse @JanesINTEL

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

IntelTrak data was featured in this recent article by @owenschurchill at @SCMPNews, "Ukraine war: one possible casualty may be Beijing's economic relationship with Kyiv."
https://t.co/H0PXc4A66j

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

@owenschurchill @SCMPNews "Over the past five years, Chinese firms have taken part in more than 30 investment projects in Ukraine, according to Janes, an open-source intelligence firm that tracks Chinese investments." @JanesINTEL

[Claire Chu @ClaireJChu]

An immense amount of detail on the individual companies/actors didn't make the final cut, like an interesting story about a company that appears to have gotten in the UN through a backdoor method - by taking the old name of a group that had already received ECOSOC accreditation.

[Claire Chu @ClaireJChu]

“'The other pattern we see is that members of the local overseas Chinese community can play a crucial role,' Chu says, referring to Yang in El Salvador. Apart from purchasing land for the special economic zone, Yang has also received delegations on behalf of the Chinese embassy."

[Claire Chu @ClaireJChu]

These companies also operate differently from the traditional, state-owned enterprises that often roll out the red carpet and pursue engagement with local community stakeholders in order to lay the groundwork for long-term market presence.

[Claire Chu @ClaireJChu]

Private ownership control, however, does not mean that the state is absent. Several of these privately owned Chinese companies have close links to China’s security forces or state apparatus, or posture themselves as "state-level" in order to evoke certain associations.

[Claire Chu @ClaireJChu]

Many of these companies are controlled by a small number of shareholders, including family units like the mother-daughter pair behind Sam Group or the Li siblings behind Wanlong Group. Motivated by entrepreneurial instincts? Or geopolitical interests? Are they mutually exclusive?

[Claire Chu @ClaireJChu]

The FT examined more than 30 reports of Chinese proposals for large-scale development projects around the world, and did a more detailed investigation of 9 projects proposed or implemented in the past 4 years with our open-source research team at @JanesINTEL.

[Claire Chu @ClaireJChu]

It's been a lot of fun working with @KathrinHille over the past 6 months on the research that went into this piece. We looked into little-known, privately-backed Chinese companies that have been stealthily pursuing ambitious projects overseas:

https://t.co/gJF0cvRwUa

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

Rosatom is reportedly pulling out of a nuclear reactor project in Hungary, "citing force majeure as its grounds for withdrawing from the project, due to the sanctions placed on Russia, following the country's invasion of Ukraine."

https://t.co/A8odbMDOyL

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

https://t.co/afkZyhNmhJ

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

RWR is excited to announce we’re joining Janes, providers of assured OSINT. In Janes we found a partner who can take our coverage of economic & financial statecraft to the next level. Together we will deliver the world’s most comprehensive foundational intelligence capability.

[Janes @JanesINTEL]

We’re delighted to announce the acquisition of RWR Advisory Group, who provide open-source research and analysis on the malign use of economic and financial statecraft, through their IntelTrak platform. Learn more https://t.co/N6DPdEWeeF #acquisition #mergersandacquisitions

[RWR Advisory Group @RWR_Advisory]

NEW REPORT: The Presence of Sanctioned Russian Companies in the U.S. Capital Markets

https://t.co/mnxZYlFryj