In Paris, President Xi will celebrate Dongfeng's entry into the capital of Peugeot Citroen, an operation that represents a French puzzle: take advantage of Chinese money without being robbed.
Thanks to Dongfeng and this share of capital, “Peugeot Citroen he's back in the big race,” writes the Xinhua news agency. In Paris, even if the Chinese president Xi who came to present the agreement will be celebrated, the consensus is not so unanimous. While on the one hand the state authorities approve the recapitalization of Pegeot, the industrialists are concerned. Jean-Dominique Senard, president of Michelin, confided to his friend Philippe Varin, great craftsman of the Pegeot-Dongfeng fusion, that he would have preferred “a European solution”.
In any case, insists Ding Yifan, deputy director of the Beijing Institute for Global Development, "economically, China in France still remains discreet". Indeed, if Europe concentrates more than a third of all Chinese mergers and acquisitions in the world (about 90 billion dollars last year, eight times more than in 2005), France has remained largely safe from this raid Chinese. In fact, it receives only 7/8% of these investments in Europe, compared to 33% in the direction of Germany and 18% in the United Kingdom. And while there are officially 300.000 Chinese nationals, fewer than 12.000 employees in Paris and the provinces work on behalf of companies from China. The Hexagon is for these red capitalists synonymous with welfare state, trade union pressure, rigorous administrative rules.
On the contrary, the official Chinese press often defines France as the "red carpet for Chinese investors", welcoming the fact that Hollande was called, during his official visit to China in April 2013, to remove "all barriers and disincentives to Chinese investment in France.
According to the forecasts of the French Directorate-General for Competitiveness, Industry and Services, the country could welcome more than 2020 billion dollars of Chinese flows every year between now and 15. “Many entrepreneurs are fascinated by France and recognize the quality and level of training of our workforce,” observes from Shanghai, Emmanuel Gros, senior consultant in the sector of the investment bank Benoit & Associates, which specializes in assisting Chinese companies in France. “I think there is a French moment, just as there was a German moment.”
