Alice Han

That number could easily rise, I think, a couple of percentage points in the next couple of years, helped along by concerns about U.S.

hegemony, concerns about U.S.

instability and the instability it's causing in other regions around the world's

I'm curious of your view on this, James, because I certainly am seeing more chatter about this in financial markets.

Yeah, you know, it goes without saying, on the oil and energy front, it is also at a disadvantage, China is, right?

On the oil and energy front, you know, if WTI goes north, continues to go north of 100, that is going to cause pressure.

If supply chains in oil continue to be constricted, that is going to cause pressure for Beijing.

But you're right, geopolitically and diplomatically, if we look at it from that vector purely,

I think this has been an unforced error by the Americans in which that has caused an opportunity for China to gain leverage, not only just in the Middle East, but also in potentially U.S.-China trade talks that are still ongoing.

Because the more that the U.S.

is distracted and bogged down in the Middle East, the less likely they're going to be firing shots at China in trade and technology export controls.

It seems, and this is, I'm just citing a Global Times piece that was really interesting that came out, I think about March 15, that one op-ed in the Global Times says, the US has set the fire and now they're asking the world to help it put it out and split the bill.

I thought that that was an interesting image and it sort of goes to the heart of how the Chinese perceive this is a mess of the American making and that the Chinese do not want to get involved in any collaborative effort.

And it reminds me to some extent what happened in 56 of the Suez Crisis.

You know, you had Britain, France trying to, you know, take control of the Suez Canal, another major choke point in Egypt.

And they did not get the approval of then U.S.

President Eisenhower, who decided to knock back

old imperial regimes would back the Egyptian President Nasser.

I think a similar thing is happening now with the Chinese deciding that they're not going to back the Americans and collaborating to demine the Strait or to unblock the Strait and put pressure on the Iranians.

So that's been interesting.