 | |
 Sanlitun SOHO has the headquarters of Caixin. | |
Native name | 财新传媒 |
|---|---|
| Company type | Privately held company |
| Industry | News andpublishing |
| Founded | 2009; 16 years ago (2009) |
| Headquarters | Chaoyang District, Beijing |
Key people | Li Ruigang (Chairman) Hu Shuli (President) |
| Products | Caixin Weekly Caixin Online |
| Website | |
Caixin Media (simplified Chinese:财新传媒;traditional Chinese:財新傳媒;pinyin:Cáixīn Chuánméi;lit. 'New Fortune') is a Chinesemedia group based inBeijing known forbusiness andinvestigative journalism.[1][2]
The founder and publisher isHu Shuli, a formerKnight Fellow in journalism atStanford University, and an honorary doctorate degree recipient fromPrinceton University. Previously, Hu foundedCaijing magazine. Yang Daming acts as deputy publisher, and Wang Shuo iseditor-in-chief.[3] The business side is headed by Zhang Lihui as executive president.[4][5][6]
The headquarters is in theSanlitunSOHO (三里屯SOHO) inChaoyang District, Beijing. There are also offices inXuhui District,Shanghai andQuarry Bay,Hong Kong.[7]
Caixin Media was established in January 2010, created subsequently to the departure ofHu Shuli and the majority of the editors and reporters atCaijing Magazine in November 2009.[8] The original staff of Caixin Media is composed entirely of employees fromCaijing.
Caijing is a financial news magazine.[9] It was founded byHu Shuli in 1998 and was managed by theStock Exchange Executive Council (SEEC[10]) whose chairman isWang Boming, The magazine largely depends on the political protection by SEEC, its well-connected backer.[11]
In November 2009,Hu Shuli resigned fromCaijing along with a large portion ofCaijing's journalists after weeks of conflicts withCaijing's controller over issues including "its coverage of sensitive current affairs stories".[11] The magazine was known for its investigative reporting and in-depth business articles; but its backer, according to departing employees, wanted it "to move away from investigative journalism towards straight coverage of business, in the mode ofFortune".[11] The pressure to focus on finance had mounted substantially since the explosion of ethnic violence in Xinjiang in July 2009; reporters atCaijing received orders from SEEC to remove sensitive stories.[9] Besides that, there were also disputes over wages.[11]Jeremy Goldkorn called Hu's departure fromCaijing "a big loss for SEEC".[11]
Caixin launched a simple English-language news site called "Caixin Online" in 2010, translating a small number of its Chinese stories each day for foreign readers. In 2016, it greatly expanded that presence with the establishment of a separate company called Caixin Global, with Hu Shuli as CEO and Li Xin as managing director. It included a new English language news app, a new English language website (www.caixinglobal.com) upgraded from Caixin Online, and a range of customized business intelligence services under the banner of Caixin Global Intelligence.[12]
The Caixin China PMI is an economic index compiled and published monthly byIHS Markit; it is often cited by market watchers and media. Caixin Media took over sponsorship of Markit's China PMI fromHSBC in 2015,[13] and the research team of Caixin Insight provides analysis for the index.
In April 2018, Caixin Global andCITIC Capital jointly acquired the international business information unit of Britain's Euromoney for $180.5 million, marking one of the biggest offshore purchases ever by a mainstream Chinese media company. The unit, Global Market Intelligence Division (GMID), was a provider of global financial information and data in over 15 languages, with a focus on emerging markets. GMID's two main units are CEIC and EMIS.[14][15]
Two months after splitting withCaijing,Hu Shuli established Caixin Media and became the executive editor of a new publication calledCaixin Weekly.[9]
Caixin Media was financed by various parties. Hu secured a 40-million yuan investment from Zhejiang Daily Press Group, the state-owned newspaper conglomerate, for a 40 percent stake in Caixin.[16] Zhejiang Daily had sought to sell a 19.77 percent stake in Caixin for 56 million yuan in 2011, but later withdrew the sale.[16] In July 2012,Tencent became Caixin's newest stockholder with an undisclosed amount of shares.[16] In December 2013,China Media Capital (CMC) said that it had purchased a 40% stake in Caixin Media from Zhejiang Daily Press Group, thus becoming the largest shareholder.[16]Li Ruigang, the chairman of CMC, said, "My fund and I are very honored to become a part of Caixin"; "Our common goal is to build a China-based financial media platform with international influences."[16]
Caixin Media initially offered content from its website, caixin.com, and its mobile app for free, but charged for the electronic version of its signature magazine. On 6 November 2017, it set up apaywall for caixin.com, becoming the first major Chinese publication to put most of its online content behind a paywall.[17]
The paywall's introduction was part of Caixin's efforts to protect content from copyright infringement and to boost revenue.[18] In May 2018, Hu Shuli, in a speech to students atRenmin University of China, said that many readers had subscribed since testing of the paywall model began in 2016, proving that the market had a positive response to the paywall model.[19]
In an interview in November 2018, one year after the paywall's introduction, Hu Shuli said Caixin had more than 200,000 digital annual subscribers.[20] Caixin's Chinese language website caixin.com receives approximately 130 million page views per month from 50 million unique visitors.[18] Hu said that readership had risen steadily.[21]
In June 2022, Caixin has around 850,000 digital subscribers, according to a new ranking by the International Federation of Periodical Publishers (FIPP). Caixin subscriptions have grown 21% since the first half of 2021, meaning it has overtaken Nikkei.com to become the world’s largest digital news subs business outside of the English-speaking world.[22] Caixin Media's paid readership exceeded 900,000 at the end of October, after the outlet became the world's largest subscription-based media outside the U.K. and the U.S. earlier this year, Hu Shuli announced at the 13th Caixin Summit.[23]
In June 2023, The International Federation of Periodical Publishers (FIPP) released the latest data from the 2023 Global Digital Subscription Report revealing that Caixin has exceeded 1 million paid subscribers, tied for eighth place in international rankings.[24]
On 7 March 2016, Caixin published an article that exposed theCyberspace Administration of China for removing an article on their Chinese website. The reasoning given for the take-down order was "illegal content". The censored article, originally published on 3 March, was about Jiang Hong, a member of theChinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, who said that advisors should be "free to giveCommunist Party and government agencies suggestions on economic, political, cultural and social issues".[25][26] Publicly exposing such censorship was considered highly unusual in China, and Caixin deliberately referred to the CAC as "a government censorship organ".[26]
On 11 November 2018, Caixin reporter Zhou Chen was harassed by police in her hotel room while on a trip to investigate a petrochemical leak inQuanzhou that sickened over 50 people. The incident prompted outrage on social media and a rare apology from the local police.[27][28][29]
On 27 March 2020, doubts were raised about the accuracy of the reportedCOVID-19 death toll of 2,535 inWuhan as Caixin published photos of a truck unloading 2,500 boxedfuneral urns arriving from aHankoufuneral home and a further 3,500 boxed funeral urns inside Jingya Hall.[30][31][32][33][34][35]
On 21 October 2021, the Cyberspace Administration of China removed Caixin from its seminal list of news media that can be re-published, substantially gagging it as a news source.[36]
Beijing Floor 5, Building 6, Sanlitun SOHO, 8 Gongti Beilu, Chaoyang District, Beijing, China. [...] Shanghai Room 1501-1502, Ascendas Plaza, 333 Tianyaoqiao Road, Xuhui District, Shanghai, China. [...] Hong Kong Room 108, Unit 2402-07, 24th Floor, Berkshire House, 25 Westlands Road, Quarry Bay, Hong Kong.-Chinese address: "地址：北京市朝阳区工体北路8号院三里屯SOHO 6号楼5层，邮政编码：100027"
Officially, the death toll in Wuhan has stalled at a little over 2,500, a detail repeatedly highlighted by China's Foreign Ministry. But something didn't add up, Caixin noted: One local crematorium in the city was operating for 19 hours a day and in just two days, 5,000 urns were delivered to the establishment.