The RMB surplus "problem" and "exchange rate problem"

Honestly, it is not really a problem if you have too much money. But it is if you have too much cash at hand and do not know how to more efficiently deploy it, and it is a problem if it becomes an excuse for other to hurt you.

Stephen Cheung proposed his solution to China's currency "problems". I will paraphrase a couple points here.

1) "There is never pressue because your currently is too strong." -- the pressure to rise and the pressure to fall do not work in symmetric manner.
My analogy will be if your boat is too light, there is no danger of it sinking. Because gravity works to your favor. When RMB is "too strong", all PBOC needs to do is too increase supply.

2) Increasing supply leads to increase in the risk of inflation. But it is so only if it stays in the domestic market. However, if the circulation is outside of China (like the greenback circulation outside the USA), it does not affect the supply level in China and there will not be pressure on inflation

3) To let RMB flow out of China the government needs to lift capital control (both ways to allow free flow) and foreign government (and people) will want RMB as one of the currencies for foreign reserve

4) However, the current strength and hence demand (and interests) of RMB in international market may not be sustainable. If the money flows back into China there will be inflation (and you cannot restrict flowing back, as no one would want to buy RMB in the first place if so).

5) To stabilise inflation China can use the commodity basket as the anchor. The commodity will then define the value of RMB and hence hold inflation to that of commodity prices.


---



张五常:人民币及其它——覆茅于轼
作者：张五常　　来源：东亚经济评论 　　发表日期: 2007-5-6

东亚经济评论　http://www.e-economic.com

茅于轼真君子也。年纪比我长，但算是同辈。我们这辈子经历过二战及之后的血泪历程的人，多多少少对国家民族有赤子之心。这方面，茅兄比我强得多了。这些年他拿着短小的本钱协助农民的教育与自力更生，令人感动。我自己只是拿着笔杆爬格子，这里那里大声疾呼，比起他亲自落手落脚，渺小得很。说赤子之心跳得比较快，比较激动，是医学之外的哲理，何况到了日暮黄昏，来日无多，这样的人免不了有点不耐烦，有点脾气了。这方面，我搞不清楚茅兄与我孰高孰低。几年前听到他在机场喝咖啡，因收费奇高，大发牢骚。当时我想，价高大可不喝，有什么牢骚可发呢？殊不知两星期前，在深圳机场，等机喝咖啡，每杯最相宜的四十，四个人坐下来，两位要喝，两位不喝，女侍应说，不喝的，只坐下，也要每位收费四十，吓得两位急急脚离开。可幸侍应提点，否则埋单收足，官司可能打到北京去。最近读到茅兄在某访问中，提到我，其中有两点与我对国家经济的看法不同。其一是间接的，没有提到我，但可能在那访问中，有人提到我只看经济效益，反对最低工资，也反对福利经济。茅兄说社会的公平与正义也重要，不可或缺。虽然公平与正义不容易鉴定为何物，我的心与茅兄的心绝对是在正确的位置。人类天生下来就不公平，所以处理这项社会问题很复杂。我的立场有五点。一、天生有缺陷的或后天遇大不幸的，我们要帮助，最好让私人或私营慈善机构处理。二、政府要放开每个人自力更生的机会，也要维护这种机会的平等。三、虽说天生下来本领不平等，但从收入那方面看，差别不是那么大，本领有别或勤奋不同而导致的收入不同我们要接受。四、机会相等但际遇不同，导致的收入不同我们也要接受，因为我们难以分辨本领与际遇所引起的收入不同。五、权势过人，或关系超凡，可以导致很大的收入差距。这后者我反对，因为违反了自力更生机会平等这个原则。是的，因为权势、关系等而导致的收入差距，是今天中国的一个大问题。反对财富不均，或反对贫富悬殊的劳苦大众，主要是见到或听到某些人靠权势及关系而大发其达。他们问：你凭什么本领比我赚那么多的钱？于是眼红，于是投诉，不平则鸣。这方面我不仅理解，而且无从反对。大家知道，因为权势及关系而导致的贫富悬殊，是中国经济改革中无可避免的。今天这改革大致成功了，还要再大走几步，是清除这类不「公平」的时候。问题是要怎样处理才对。答案当然是要清除那些因为权势及关系而说得上是腐败的机会及行为。是艰巨的工程，北京不可能不知道要做，但「关系」这回事，虽然我不懂，也可以想象不易处理。我懂的——这里要向茅兄提出——是以修改收入不均的办法会有适得其反的效果。增加累进税率吗？难不倒有权有势的人——这一点，四十多年前戴维德早就提出了，支持这论点的证据有的是。推出最低工资、福利经济等项目吗？也适得其反，因为这些不鼓励收入低下的力争上游，贫富悬殊驱之不去也。转谈人民币，茅于轼的观点与我的不同，直接地提到我。有两点，相关的。其一，茅兄认为币值上升是发展起来的国家必会出现的情况，不让人民币升值是守不住的。其二，如果中国开放金融（包括取消汇管），人民币一定升值。这两点是传统的谬误，让我澄清吧。一、欧洲经济发展得最顺利的二百年，用本位制，币值是稳定而没有上升的。日圆当年大幅上升，一则起于美国压力，二则有本土富有人士支持，其效果是发展得非常可观的经济，兵败如山倒，不景长达二十多年，到今天还翻不了身。当年我是第一个推断了日本的不幸。前年史坦福一位大教授以整本书分析日本的惨痛经验，他支持中国，极力反对人民币升值，是基于他对日本的研究了。二、蒙代尔也极力反对人民币升值，是基于二千年前罗马帝国与上述欧洲发展的经验，认为稳定币值是经济运作的一个重点。佛利民与蒙代尔之争，起于佛老认为，脱离了本位制后，一个大国不容易下一个固定的锚──佛老于是支持fiat money制。我起初站在佛老那边，但后来多番思考……的货币制度，知道一个大国的货币可以下一个固定的锚。英国的货币大师C. Goodhart也是下锚的拥护者，一九八三年香港考虑联系汇率时，我跟他研讨过。今天，大家的意见有出入之处，不是应不应该下锚，而是这个锚要怎样下才对。我考虑以一篮子物品为锚，起自一九八三，佛老当时认为成本太高，但后来朱老政策的经验，使我意识到以一个指数为锚可以稳守。一九九七我说人民币是强币，二○○二说人民币是天下最强，二○○三年初说美国一定会施压──这些走在历史前头的话是有记载的。二○○三起我再考虑，在朱老的货币制度下转用一篮子物品为锚，反复考虑无数次，认为不可能错，是最好的货币制度。以一篮子物品的价值指数为货币之锚，政府是不需要提供物品的，成本甚低也。在这制度下，央行不要手痒，学人家搞什么货币政策。回头说fiat money，用的是以目标（targets）为锚，以币量或利率调控经济的政策不能不用。精明如格林斯潘，在任二十年利息率轮上轮落轮了八次，与朱老的制度相比，输了几条街。三、说过了，币值的下降压力与上升压力是不对称的。一种货币的币值要下降，处理不容易：外汇储备可能不足，减少币量不是举手之劳，不知要减多少才对，就算成功，减少币量的效果可能要等长时日才见到。但币值有上升压力，要之不升易过借火。目前央行压制人民币上升的办法，是约束需求。这是大错。他们要倒转过来，增加供应。大量把人民币放出，是简单的事，要人民币「弱」到哪里都可以。困难是通胀的问题。解决的办法有两个要点。其一是开放金融，取消汇管，让人民币大量流出国外。数之不尽的亚洲国家、市民要持人民币，政府也要人民币作储备。把人民币放出去中国可以赚很多钱，这是劳苦大众的努力促成人民币强劲的回报了。不明白为什么央行不这样做。会有通胀吗？如果人民币在外地使用，或被外地的政府用作储备，中国本土是不会引起通胀的。人民币在外地代替了其它货币的一部分，央行赚大钱，也协助了外地的经济稳定性。其二，如果放了出去的人民币大量回流，中国会有通胀。采用我建议的以一篮子物品为锚，可大显神通矣。坚守这个锚，不会有通胀，何况这个锚的物价指数可以调整，向上向下调整都可以。万无一失，因为央行有那么多的外汇储备（简直水浸），有需要时可把人民币买回来。天下间不可能有一个国家不希望有今天中国的币值上升压力！因为压力是上升的，处理容易，央行不要让地下（其实是地上）钱庄做独市生意了。开放金融，解除汇管，上海会在三年后超越香港！这类宏观推断我历来准确。

Shameful Distortion -- rules vs authority

This article got me ROFLMAO. I think Mr Karlgaard's title should be switched with his next title "Shameful Distortion". How a prejudiced pair of eyes got fixated on some outlying examples and reached certain ridiculous conclusions.

Mr Karlgaard's conclusion for China is:

• "it seems to me that 99.99% of Chinese wake up each day with a core belief: Anything not expressly permitted is not permitted at all."

Well, all I have heard of is exactly the opposite. And that is the major weakness of the Chinese tradition we seek to change. Among these are related issues that actually formed part of our debate in the Chinese blogsphere here in HK.

(edited to add: if Chinese people had been behaving as Mr Karlgaard has alleged, China would have been developed in parallel to Japan for the past 150 years)

Unfortunately, Mr Karlgaard confused observing rule with observing authority. What he has observed was blind obedience to authority (i.e. one's superior) and lack of empowerment, not blind obedience to rules and laws.

For your entertainment below:
---

China's Mental Default

Rich Karlgaard

On a recent trip to China (to host a FORBES cruise for Investors), it didn't take long to catch a whiff of the fact that all is not perfect in the Middle Kingdom. During the bus ride from Beijing airport to the Shangri-La Hotel, the tour guide kept mentioning housing prices. These were soaring, "unlike in the days of Mao," she kept telling us, "when the government provided for housing." The guide linked the dead dictator's name with free housing a half-dozen times. There it was: Mao nostalgia.

She also fed us bad chop suey regarding the U.S. dollar. "The street vendors don't take dollars anymore," she said. "You must change dollars to yuan." This turned out to be laughably untrue. Tiananmen Square was crammed with vendors who gladly took U.S. dollars. They pushed, elbowed and practically knocked down your children to get to your U.S. dollars. I bought two Mao watches for $15. Each ceased working about an hour after the purchase, just like Mao's economy.

Now, I don't doubt for a minute that China's spectacular 9%-to-10% economic growth rate will continue for many more years. You can bet on it. The Chinese economy is like a huge rubber band: At one end is the economy that can turn out Apple (nasdaq: AAPL - news - people ) iPods to perfection; at the other end are all those sad, sunburned fellows with bad teeth and Mao hats--refugees from rural China--who stand by the roadside with shovels. You see scores to hundreds of them at every construction site. They stand around smoking cigarettes and occasionally haul a load of dirt from here to there. Prison work gangs are more productive. Which is why the Apple iPod economy will snap the shovel economy forward. This is guaranteed.

What's not a slam dunk are changes in the average Chinese person's attitude. For every Chinese entrepreneur like Alibaba's Jack Ma (check him out on Wikipedia), there must be 10,000 who fear sticking out, bucking authority or going off-script. You see this everywhere. One afternoon at the Shangri-La, my wife, kids and I decided to abort a long elevator wait and take the stairs. Up we trudged to the 13th floor--they have 13th floors in China--but on the 12th we were met by a startled hotel employee. He nearly passed a brick seeing us on the stairway. He shouted for us to walk back down.

"Just one more floor," we begged. "Down! Down!" he shouted.

Another anecdote among several: One night the hotel left a complimentary bottle of wine in our room. We took it to dinner in a hotel restaurant. This confused the waitstaff no end. Four or five of them consulted frantically. Finally, their leader stepped forward to say that bringing the bottle of wine was "not permitted!"

"But it's a gift from the hotel," we protested.

"Not permitted," repeated the waiter. He wasn't angry. He wanted to do the right thing, but he was afraid. You could see it in his eyes.

Perhaps my Western eyes see this unfairly, but it seems to me that 99.99% of Chinese wake up each day with a core belief: Anything not expressly permitted is not permitted at all.
But that's most of life: Not permitted! Ask yourself: How far can China really go if "not permitted" is the default mental mindset of the country's vast majority?

Maybe this won't be a key question during the next 10 years. China has so much catching up to do it can easily grow 10% a year for another decade. Crunch time, I think, will come in the 10- to 20-year time frame. Unless attitudes change, that's when the "not permitted" mental default will begin to slow China's incredible march forward.

Shameful Distortion

I usually like USA TODAY .....

Reading list Q1 2007

雅克萨之战

一夜之間中產變無產

The Trouble with Japanese Nationalism

China's Fantasy of Freedom

温家宝：关于社会主义初级阶段的历史任务和我国对外政策的几个问题

郑永年：渐进开放与中国政治转型

张五常：未富先骄说

Plugging A Math Gap

America's unsinkable fleet

The fair trade coffee scam

Sailing into Harm's Way versus the Dangerously Eloquent Jeff Faux

张五常：薄熙来的看法不对

Curse of the Golden Flower

中國熱下的嫉妒與憧憬

Perestroikia and Glasnost in China? Wen Jiabao's new poem quote: (去问开化的大地,去问解冻的河流)

Premier Wen told the reporter, without being prompted with a question (see context here)
'解决民生问题还要让人民生活得快乐和幸福。这就要保障人民的民主权利，在社会推进公平与正义。记者也许问，什么叫快乐？我可以借用艾青诗人的一句话：“请问开花的大地，请问解冻的河流”。谢谢！'
'To solve the livelihood problem we need our people to live with happiness and look after their well-being. This means we need to protect the demoncrat rights of our peple, andpush for fairness and righteousness in our society. Reporters, you may ask, "What is happiness?" May I borrow a line from poet Ai Qing, "(go) to ask the land that is opening up (literally, here it means the melting of frozen land), (go) to ask the river that is defreezed."'

Quite irrelevant answer, isn't it? People digged out the original poem (not sure if ESWN would translate this one) by poet Ai Qing, "Quarrel outside the window"

窗外的争吵
艾青
昨天晚上 last night
我听见两个声音—— i heard two voices
春天： Spring (said):
大家都在咒骂你 Everybody is cursing you
整天为你在发愁 they were bored by you whole days
谁也不会喜欢你 nobody will like you
你让大家吃苦头 you make everybody suffered
冬天： Winter:
我还留恋这地方 I still miss this place
你来的不是时候 you have not come at the right time
我还想打扫打扫 i still want to sweep and clean a bit
什么也不给你留 i will leave nothing for you
春天：Spring:
你真是冷酷无情 You are really cold and heartless
闹得什么也没有 your fuss will leave us with nothing
难道糟蹋得还少 hasn't you ruined not enough
难道摧毁得不够 hasn't you destroy not enough
冬天： W:
我也有我的尊严 I also have my dignity
我讨厌嬉皮笑脸 I hate to be playful
看你把我怎么办 so look what you can do with me
我就是不愿意走 I am just here not going to leav
春天： S:
别以为大家怕你 Don't be mistaken that everybody (the people) are afraid of you
到时候你就得走 when it is time you will have to leave
你不走大家轰你 if you do not everybody will throw you out
谁也没办法挽留 no one can keep you with any means
用不到公民投票 no need to wait until citizen to vote
用不到民意测验 no need to wait for an opinion poll
用不到开会表决 no need to wait until a vote in a meeting
用不到通过举手 no need to wait for a show of hands
去问开化的大地 Go to ask the land that is opening up (literally, here it means the melting of frozen land)
去问解冻的河流 Go to ask the river that is defreezed
去问南来的燕子 Go to ask the swallows that are coming from the south
去问轻柔的杨柳 Go to ask the willow that move witht he breeze
地里种子要发芽 Seeds in the land will sprout
枝头骨朵要吐秀 Buds at the end of branch will blossom
万物都频频点头 Ten thousand matters all nod and nod again
异口同声劝你走 All different mouths ask you to leave in unison
你要是赖着不走 If you shameless less stick out here
用拖拉机拉你走 (we) will pull you away with tractors
用推土机推你走 will push you away with bulldozers
敲锣打鼓送你走 striking drums and gongs while we get rid of you

一九八０年春节

Winter and Spring had a word fight, winter did not want to leave, spring showed winter why her era is dated. Winter showed many reasons for resisting to change. (it runs in parallel with many of the argument about any kind of reform in this world). Then Spring said,

• "no need to wait until citizen to vote,
  no need to wait for an opinion poll,
  no need to wait until a vote in a meeting,
  no need to wait for a show of hands....
  
  Go to ask the land that is opening up (literally, here it means the melting of frozen land),
  Go to ask the river that is defreezed,
  Go to ask the swallows that are coming from the south,
  Go to ask the willow that move witht he breeze...
  
  Seeds in the land will sprout,
  Buds at the end of branch will blossom,
  Ten thousand matters all nod and nod again
  All different mouths ask you to leave in unison...

The Quiz is simple enough: who is spring, who is winter?
What about "happiness"? Onepossible answer: if you have had to pretend and endure winter for 17 years, and finally you have gained control...

Related link:

1) 温家宝言外之意是自由不可阻挡——评本届政府总理温家宝最后一次回答中外记者问

2) 温总理引用艾青诗句含义深刻

Time zone mystery

There are many oddities in time zones.

e.g. China spans the similar width and size as the USA. China chose to have one single time zone for convenience, and leave its people decide when to go to work. As a result, people in NE China go to work at 6am, while those in Xinjiang and Tibet do it at 10am. The upside is that one does not have to adjust the clock and there is no risk of missing train or plane while travelling. There is also little risk of missing phone conference.

But there are more. See this map. The bottom color denotes what the time zone that vertical strip really belongs to. e.g. Malaysia and Singapore belong to Zone 7 (dark blue/purple -- that of Indoneisa and Indo-China), but they chose to be in the same zone as China, perhaps for good practical reason today. (or back in the British colonial era?)

Othe oddity

• Whole of Alaska is shift 1 time zone to that of the SE strip of the capital Juneau (it is doing what China does). Perhaps also such that it is only 1 hr behind PST.
• Argentina chose to align with Brazil by stepping out of the zone it belongs to
• France, Spain, Portugal, Algeria and Morocco went with the EU and left the UK zone.
• The whole ex-USSR seems to be always on summer time

Significant statistically: those 800 odd people do not represent us

For the so called election in HK

Total eligible votes: 795
Total votes cast: 772

Leung=123: 16%
Tsang= 649: 84%

if the invalid votes are assumed as for protesting against Tsang, then it would be 18%:82%

Now, if we believe the poll is correct, it is more like 21:62 OR 25%:75%. The margin of error of these surveys are usually only a few percentage point (e.g. 3%).

There is no way the 2 results would overlap.

China's dream for brand

Yes, brand means high margin, obscene profit, easy money. China wants it. It wants to create international brand. It supports its enterprises to expand overseas.

We have seen Lenovo, Haier, CNOOC, TCL, all expanding overseas, dreaming of building a global brand, with mixed success.

This is not to say one should not try. Many European and American enterprises have suffered the TCL style fisaco. The problem with China is, as Premier Wen pointed out in his recent essay, do the other ("non-brand") Chinese companies receive fair treatment from the goverment and the Chinese banks? Are these deals fair to the banks and the shareholders of the bank?

What the Chinese bureaucrats need to know is, perhaps, what does brand really mean?

Terry Guo of Hon Hai precision, famous for the iPOD manyfacturing and the Foxconn "scandal" and success (the share price increased more than 4 folds in less than a year after IPO), has this to say (source: Fong Cheuk Yu)

• 「 沒 錯 ， 我 們 沒 有 品 牌 ， 但 製 造就 是 我 們 的 品 牌 。 我 們 不 是 大 眾 的 品 牌 ， 但 我 們 是 供 應 商 的 品 牌 。 其 實 我 認 為 品 牌很 難 做 ， 尤 其 是 中 國 大 陸 ， 誰 還 記 得 那 麼 多 牌 子 ？ 」
• Right, we do not produce a brand, but manufacturing is our brand. We are not a consumer brand, but we are a brand among the OEM/ODM...

Hon Hai is indeed a brand owners' brand. McDonald is a consumer brand, as all the consumers know that what McDonald means and know its quality. Hon Hai enjoys exactly that among all the brand owners, Apple, Motorola, Xbox, HP, Dell, etc.

So are TSMC, Wanxiang, Johnson Electric, and many factories in the Pearl and Yangtze delta.

A brand does not have to be recognized by an average consumer, it just has to be recognized by its customers.

Hong Kong: pan-Dem's strategic dillemma

These days most of the commentaries in Apple Daily around the local politics are best described with the Cantonese idiom "打飞机" ( "jerk off" in English ). The front page today looks more like the editotials in WSJ, except WSJ does not do that on its front page, or any page other than the op-ed page. I can almost run Apple Daily in parallel with Wen Hui Pao during the Tung era, if I am allowed to exaggerate a bit.

So it is refreshing to see some independent commentary such as this one, by Lam Kay: 泛民主派的三條戰略問題 (The 3 strategic issues for pan-Dem).

I am one of those who supports their ideal but am totally disappointed by their non-strategy and stupidity - that includes the party organ Apple Daily which is willing to sacrifice the credibility it took so many years to build.

One of the many strategic mistakes by the pan-Dem, as lam Kay rightly pointed out, is that they forgot to do their home work, and were extremely sloppy when it comes to addressing the voters' need, and mis-aligned its target audience with the low income group, who has more imminent problem to worry that long term democracy

• 泛民主派過度集中基層路線，甚至是成立只有一年的公民黨，在政治光譜上都堆在左翼：關心基層市民需要，扶助社會最有需要的一批人，道德上絕對正確；可是泛民可有正視政治現實？香港泛民主派的支持者，有更多屬中產或以上的階層，民意調查結果顯示，愈高學歷的市民，對形而上「民主」的概念支持度愈高；基層人士的數目表面上很多，但不少卻屬於親政府的「死硬派」；然而中間偏右的一群人，目前卻沒有一個泛民政黨可以選擇－－不少年輕的專業人士，政治上沒有鮮明的見解，可是泛民長期忽視這批人的需要，把他們趕到親政府陣營之中。
• the pan-Dem focused too much on the grass-root path......it is absolutely correct to help those who are in need, but has pan-dem faced the political reality?.....poll results showed, the more educated the citizens, the more likely they will support the "democracy" ideal.....the grassroot is large in numbers, but many of them are "die-hard" supporers of the pro-government wing......many young professionals, who are ambiguous in political views, were ignored by pan-dem all these years, and were pushed to the pro-government camp

Politics is also about segmentation, i.e., to maximize vote. This is something the Republicans have some very well in the US. pan-Dem totally failed this test. If democracy is about answering to the majority of the people, why don't they just follow what most people want? Sometimes, the key to success is quite simple.

---

p.s. There is a question I wanted to ask both of these candidate, "would you really open the Lo Wu border for 24 hours?"....and I am wondering why Anthony Leung failed to ask this, when he was accusing Tsang of favouring the property developers.

Wen Jiabao's essay

No time to blog, but I still would try to update my reading list on the top of the column on the right. This seem cannot be subscribed through RSS.

---

Busy work schedule caused me to have missed the very important essay by Wen Jianbao (see the reading list panel for a couple related discussion links): 关于社会主义初级阶段的历史任务和我国对外政策的几个问题, "A few issues about the historic mission during the initial stage of socialism development and our foreigh policy" (I suppose by now there might already have been some English translation?)

It is significant, not because it offers any new breakthrough in political theory, socialism theology, or China's foreign policy, but because it is the first time that Wen has spoken out to steer China back to Dengism, and make it explicit that China needs to get thing right (and what he means by "getting it right"). To some observers (who believes Hu Jintao has veered away from Deng's "Lay low" (TGYH) policy, this may mean a public show down of disagreement between Hu and Wen. (For those who have read this blog, you would know I tend to agree more with Deng and Wen)

The key points IMO is basically, as Professor Zheng Yongnian of Nottingham University said, "Back to Dengism"

• "A fair environment is required to enhance productivity" (不随着生产力的发展而相应地逐步推进社会公平与正义，就不可能愈益充分地调动全社会的积极性和创造活力，因而也就不可能持久地实现生产力的大发展) This is the foundation of modern capitalism. Wen went on to say such mechanism is not the monopoly of modern capitalism, to adapt it into the "socialistic theory of Chinese characteristic". Well, he actually has a good point, uncorrupted and fair play is exactly the reason for the success of Scandivanian countries, and they are really a hybrid of true socialism and capitalism.
• There is a long way to go for China -- i.e. China still needs to lay low and avoid any potential conflict for the next 100 years (TGYH!)

The appreciation (and the public declaration) of a need for a fair system is profound. It means China is finally ready to reform its legal and political system. It realized that the unfairness (and the corruption that it has so sincerely be fighting recently) has started to drag the feet of its development. If the system is not fair, the rules in the market are distorted. When the rules are distorted, the most competitive and more efficient company will not win in the market. This means Chinese development will stall or be capped at certain level. This has already been demonstrated by the fact that the expansion of Chinese companies to the world has so far met with extremely limited success. (TCL is one example. Even the calabrated Haier's path has not been exactly smooth)

各方 Ah Q 一致判定特首選戰：梁家傑再勝曾蔭權

(For the real "all-side view" see ESWN)

Apple Daily Title:

各方一致判定特首選戰：梁家傑再勝曾蔭權
Translated: "All sides verdict on the CE election debate: Leung won again over Tsang"

Apple Daily data right below the title:

特 首 第 二 次 辯 論 後 調 查 結 果

昨 晚 表 現 較 好
曾 蔭 權 ： 38.5% 梁 家 傑 ： 38.8%
表 現 較 上 次 改 善
曾 蔭 權 ： 54.4% 梁 家 傑 ： 37.9%
表 現 較 上 次 差 劣
曾 蔭 權 ： 10.2% 梁 家 傑 ： 16.2%
假 設 明 日 投 票 投 給 誰
曾 蔭 權 ： 64.8% 梁 家 傑 ： 21.9%

資 料 來 源 ： 港 大 民 意 研 究 計 劃

Translated:
HKU Poll results: (margin of error was suppressed by Mr. Apple Q)
Who performed better: Leung 38.5%, Tsang 38.8%
Who improved from last debate: L 54.4%, T 37.9%
Who performed worse compared with last debate: L 10.2%, 16.2%
Who will you vote if you can vote tomorrow: Leung 21.9%; Tsang: 64.8%

---
Let's face it, Jimmy Lai, we just haven't got a very eloquent (or capable) candidate.