Luxury e-tailer sails into Aussie-China trade war

Cettire

07/02/2022 03:59

(The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions
expressed are their own.)
    MELBOURNE, Feb 7 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Don’t let
diplomatic and trade tensions get in the way of bagging a deal.
That’s the approach China’s JD.com  JD.O   9618.HK  and Cettire
 CTT.AX  are taking in the partnership https://www.asx.com.au/asxpdf/20220207/pdf/455qhvm353x2ny.pdf
 they inked on Monday. The tie-up will spearhead the Australian
online retailer’s plan to enter what Bain & Co expects will be
the world’s biggest luxury market by 2025. Shareholders added as
much as 18% to its value in early trading. 
    It’s a bold move: Granted, A$1 billion ($710 million)
Cettire just sells other companies’ upmarket products, from
Valentino handbags to Alexander McQueen shoes and clothing. So
it won’t come under the same pressure as exporters of Aussie
wine, coal, rock lobster  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N2Q20N3 and other goods. Beijing
effectively banned these and other imports in 2020, costing
almost $13 billion https://www.australiachinarelations.org/sites/default/files/20211130%20Economic%20reality%20bites%20-%20What%20Australia%20needs%20to%20know%20amidst%20US-China%20strategic%20competition_James%20Laurenceson%20and%20Thomas%20Pantle.pdf
 in lost exports in the first nine months of 2021, per the
Australia-China Relations Institute.
    But politicians are still waging a war of words: Australia’s
Defence Minister Peter Dutton told the Sydney Morning Herald on
Monday that the country and its allies will “lose the next
decade” https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/australia-will-lose-next-decade-unless-it-stands-up-to-china-dutton-20220112-p59ntk.html
 if they don’t stand up to China in the South China Sea. The
Cettire-JD.com relationship could yet get tricky. (By Antony
Currie) 
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 (Editing by Robyn Mak and Katrina Hamlin)
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