harjanim

Maintaining my forecast.

Tracking two new developments:

(1) A poll by the Institute for National Defence and Security Research - a Taiwanese think-tank affiliated with its military - indicating 61% thinking it was unlikely or very unlikely that China would invade in the next 5 years based on responses from 1,200 people in September 2024. https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/most-taiwanese-believe-china-unlikely-invade-coming-five-years-poll-shows-2024-10-09/

(2) Drills by China around Taiwan in October 2024 that included practicing for a blockade of Taiwan's ports and a closer proximity compared to previous drills. https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/takeaways-chinas-latest-war-games-around-taiwan-2024-10-15/

Maintaining my forecast.

The race between Apple, Microsoft and Nvidia in terms of market cap remains quite close. Nvidia had a recent rally, but I don't see any signs of a change in its business model or operating environment that will pull it significantly ahead of Apple or Microsoft.

https://www.reuters.com/technology/nvidia-overtakes-apple-worlds-most-valuable-company-2024-10-25/

Interestingly, Masayoshi Son has argued that Nvidia is undervalued at present.

https://vulcanpost.com/875009/nvidia-undervalued-even-at-current-market-cap-masayoshi-son/

Maintaining my forecast.

One interesting read to share on Putin's potential successors: https://theweek.com/feature/briefing/1024619/putins-potential-successors

Will be interesting to see if the July 2024 survey by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) will be updated again soon. The survey asked more than 40 experts on Russia to forecast how power will change hands in Russia. The dominant response (40%) is Putin's death. A "palace coup" was estimated at 23%.

https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-putin-succession-successor-politics/33047855.html

Making a 10% downward adjustment to the probability of a "yes" answer for this question.

Two reasons: (1) there's been a general lack of new developments to suggest market conditions will push Huawei to adopt O-RAN, and (2) O-RAN just doesn't fit well in Huawei's business model and its target markets.

Maintaining my forecast. 

One interesting technical development I came across was the release of an open-source 5G network slicing platform for O-RAN that is 3GPP-compliant. This suggests that even if there is no formal integration between 3GPP and O-RAN Alliance specifications, there may be open-source solutions developed that are interoperable for the purpose of advancing specific use cases such as network slicing.

https://arxiv.org/html/2410.12978v1

Maintaining my forecast.

Not much happening to suggest the need to change the currently assigned probability.

One interesting development to track is what's happening in Germany, where it appears that the government is allowing Huawei to remain involved in its network infrastructure. This would of course change with a second Trump administration, which may revive its "Clean Networks" initiative.

https://www.lightreading.com/5g/the-kill-huawei-mission-is-being-jeopardized-by-germany

Making a downward adjustment to my forecast's probability by 3%.

This helps account for developments that are leading to a tightening noose on investments by US companies in China related to AI, particularly the finalization of rules first announced in June: https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/us-finalizes-rules-curb-ai-investments-china-impose-other-restrictions-2024-10-28/

A related factor is the gradual bleed-out of talent as US-China rivalry weighs heavily on Chinese citizens working for American MNCs like Microsoft - for example, Moonshot AI, a fast-rising Chinese AI startup, recruited Tan Xu from Microsoft Research Asia's Machine Learning Group, where he was formerly a principal research manager.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/chinese-tech-firms-scramble-recruit-093000104.html

Further downward adjustment to my forecast.

A census which the junta put forward as a prerequisite for elections was extended due to Typhoon Yagi and ongoing difficulties for junta officials to gather census data due to fighting.

https://www.rfa.org/english/news/myanmar/election-census-extension-10162024052255.html

Meanwhile, the country is plunging even further into crisis as  the three main ethnic militias - known as the Three Brotherhood Alliance - have gained ground and weakened the position of Myanmar's military, the Tatmadaw. 

https://apnews.com/article/myanmar-civil-war-militia-1027-offensive-takeaways-63b33397204b8ff78ede24f1e699ceef

Maintaining my forecast. As with my previous assessment, the country to watch is Saudi Arabia.

An interesting letter from the Saudi ambassador to the UK in The Guardian published earlier this point reiterated the basic fact that a two-state solution is a precondition for normalization.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/oct/02/normalisation-of-saudi-arabia-israel-relations-depends-on-two-state-solution