James Kynge

Tim Cook is in China at the moment.

He's been opening a big store.

And previous to that, he was at the China Development Forum in Beijing.

And there he was using some mollifying language.

He said, we are committed to collaborating with our partners across China and with all of you to make this vision of progress at Apple a reality.

It didn't really seem to address the issue head on, but I think it was supposed to mollify opinion in China that is turning against Apple to some degree.

So to me, what is happening to Apple in China is that it's being pressured by the Chinese government to make commercial concessions.

And it's already made one, but China wants more.

And I'm James King.

Yes, I think China remains highly important to Apple.

And to me, this story is really bigger than just Apple in China.

This is a story that says, in this case, when China says jump,

Apple will jump, at least to some degree.

That's because Apple has invested so much in the China market and because Apple gets such a large proportion of its global revenues from China.

And the reason why I think this is such a big issue is because Apple is not the only company experiencing these types of dynamics in the China market.

In fact, there are lots of US companies and lots of European companies that are in the same boat.

that China is so important to them that when the government of China says you've got to do this or you've got to do that, they would be rash to ignore such instructions completely.

And as you mentioned, we had Patrick McGee on the podcast and he said that basically China has captured America's most famous company.

It's an extraordinary realization that Apple is worth about 3.7 trillion US dollars on the stock market

But it isn't really the company's shareholders that actually call the shots, at least not in China.