James Kynge

I'd like to bring it around to the money side of this, because this is also really considerable money.

I used to collect a few things when I was in China, a bit of furniture here and there.

None of it was worth very, very much money.

But I've been reading about some of the top collectors in China.

There's Liu Yixian and Wang Wei.

They're often cited as China's top collecting power couple.

and they've spent billions of renminbi on art.

They spent 36 million US dollars on a Ming Dynasty chicken cup.

You mentioned the cabbage, which I've actually seen in Taiwan's National Museum.

This is a rather nondescript cup, if you ask me, but

They bought it for 36 million US dollars, and they also spent 45 million US dollars on a Tibetan tapestry.

So, you know, there are lots of collectors all throughout China, and some of them are spending huge amounts of money.

And, you know, it's quite surprising on the number of different things that Chinese people collect and the number of different things in which a market is now being created that

There's a market even for those Mao badges, you know, those badges that everybody used to have to wear during the period of Chairman Mao, particularly during the Cultural Revolution.

I think many Chinese people hate to look back at that part of their history, but others are now collecting those badges, and there is a bit of a market in that kind of thing as well.

Do you collect any Chinese stuff, Alice?

Yeah, I mean, I'm afraid I don't have the financial resources to be called any kind of a collector, but I got a few things here and there.

You know, I got a couple of bits of porcelain from my time in China and a couple of bits of furniture, which I rather like, but they're not worth that much.

Okay, last week, my prediction was about Chinese AI emotional companions.

So this week, I thought I'd go to the other end of the spectrum and give a political prediction.