Published: June 17th, 2021,
Last updated: January 27th, 2023
The fear of Beijing’s shopping spree was great. Given the Covid pandemic, people from Lisbon to Brussels and Berlin to Nicosia feared that China could now go on a bargain hunt for ailing companies from the key industries of the European Union. An electricity supplier here, a producer of important industrial metals there, and perhaps an airport to boot. But this does not prove to be true.