With the onset of 2009, Beijing is cracking down on web portals and search engines that publish material deemed to be too vulgar or subversive for the nation’s 300 million-plus Internet users. Chinese authorities have reportedly implemented new software that lets them more easily track and counter threats, and have issued stern warnings to industry leaders such as Baidu.com Inc. (ADR: BIDU) and Google Inc. (GOOG).

The government earlier this week cited 19 Web sites - including Baidu, Google, Sohu, Sina, and Tianya - as purveyors of vulgar content that is morally or politically destructive.

Some results produced by search engines had “large amounts of pornographic links [and] after notification from the complaint center, the site did not take effective countermeasures,” the State Council Information Office said in a statement.

“Some Web sites have exploited loopholes in laws and regulations,” said Cai Minzhao, deputy chief of the Information

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The pure capitalist tends to drool a bit at the mere mention of a captive market. The opportunity to sell into a marketplace that has only a few favored suppliers is a dream come true. In most instances, captive markets are few and far in-between, but when they do show up, it’s an opportunity to take advantage.

To suggest China as a captive market, hinged on knowing the right people with the right permits, may or may not be a stretch. It is, however, a process/tradition that is an important part of doing business in China. Finding a Chinese company that has a solid position within the Chinese business infrastructure is one such opportunity where an investor may be able to do a little drooling, even when the rest of the world is looking for a solid footing.

Gulf Resources Inc., a bromine/specialty chemicals manufacturing company, works to develop and market

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Mixed martial arts (MMA) is sport that most Americans are just learning about. The Fight Zone, Inc. (TFZI.PK) is taking the reins when it comes to getting the word out about the sport by aggressively managing, developing, and marketing events. MMA is a full contact sport that artfully blends skills from wrestling, boxing, and martial arts. MMA is quickly becoming the fastest growing sport in North America and has grabbed the attention of 18 to 34-year-old males, which is a key spending demographic group.

Interestingly, the ancient Greeks had a form of MMA in the early Olympic Games. Pankration, which means “all powers”, actually combined wrestling and boxing skills. Matches would traditionally last for hours and end when one of the participants was “tapped out” by either being pinned down or placed in a hold that could result in a significant injury, knock out,

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Gulf Resources, Inc. (OTCBB: GFRE) reported it was revising its expected 2008 income to between $20 million and $23 million. This positive change came after the company, a manufacturer of bromine, crude salt and specialty chemical products in China, announced about $23 million in new customer orders for the fourth quarter, up significantly over the third quarter of 2008.

GFRE pointed out that third quarter bromine orders from some of its customers were delayed as a result of the Olympic Games and related government restrictions on many chemical factories in Beijing and Qingdao.

“We are extremely pleased to see the surge in placed orders as a result of the revival of the chemical industry after the Olympic Games,” said Ming Yang, Gulf Resources CEO. “Robust demand for bromine and chemical products in China together with our rapidly expanding production capacity and increased production efficiency will allow us to continue capturing a larger

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Sohu.com Inc. (SOHU) is one of China's largest web networks, running 7 Chinese language web properties and proprietary search engines. The company has been on fire as Internet access expands across China and its growing middle class. Analysts expect 2008 year over year earnings growth of 293.89%.

Sohu.com's Revenue Explodes

On Jul 28, the company reported second quarter earnings and beat its own prior guidance and Wall Street estimates by 45.71%, or 32 cents per share. Net income surged 60.1% to $40.2 million, or $1.02 per share, from $25.1 million, or 64 cents in the year-ago period.

Revenues continued to soar, rising 162%, and 20% quarter-on-quarter, to $102 million from $39 million in the second quarter of 2007. Total revenues exceeded $100 million for the first time in the company's history. Advertising revenues were hot, growing 53% year-over-year to $43.4 million.

Sohu.com was the Internet Content Sponsor for

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VANCOUVER, B.C. - The U.S. financial crisis has cut so deep - and the government has taken on so much debt in misguided attempts to bail out such companies as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac - that even larger financial shocks are still to come, global investing guru Jim Rogers said in an exclusive interview with Money Morning. Indeed, the U.S. financial debacle is now so ingrained - and a so-called "Super Crash" so likely - that most Americans alive today won’t be around by the time the last of this credit-market mess is finally cleared away - if it ever is, Rogers said. The end of this crisis "is a long way away," Rogers said. "In fact, it may not be in our lifetimes." During a 40-minute interview during a wealth-management conference in this West Coast Canadian city last month, Rogers also said:...

Events in the month of August have certainly placed our modern notions of nationalism, identity, sovereignty, and the Westphalian concept of the nation state under close scrutiny. This bit from Alvaro Vargas Llosa on individual sovereignty and the Olympics is quite cool: Hammon was vilified by many people in the sports world, including Anne Donovan, the U.S. women's basketball coach, who said that she was "not a patriotic person." Hammon's decision to play with the Russians contains a moral message. Individual sovereignty, it tells us, is a space that no collective force should violate. Invoking nationalist notions to condemn a woman's pursuit of a dream that does no harm to anyone is to put national sovereignty above individual sovereignty -- the seed of totalitarian ideology. Hammon does not love her ancestors, her family, her Silver Stars teammates or her friends on the U.S. national ...

With the Beijing Olympics now over, we wanted to get caught up with how the Chinese stock markets have been performing, especially in light of a slowdown in the U.S. market. Zacks senior analyst Paul Cheung, CFA was on hand with his thoughts.

Were there many surprises in quarterly earnings for Chinese companies under coverage?

By far most Chinese companies in my coverage performed as expected. Some Internet companies even announced results which exceeded the market consensus.

The slowing economy in the U.S. and now elsewhere has created a drag on many industries. Is China feeling the impact of this?

The slowing economy in the U.S. has resulted in a slowdown of the Chinese economy. In addition to the slowdown of the Chinese economy, high inflation rates have led to high pressure on earnings of Chinese companies. Among those, Internet companies should be in better position than other Chinese companies to

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From time to time, we receive occasional contributions from the highly respected Russian human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov, who heads up Russia's Rule of Law Institute. Below is his take on the invasion of Georgia. Markelov's article does not necessarily represent the opinion of Robert Amsterdam, this blog, or its editors. The immediate battle area By Stanislav Markelov Если Вы хотите прочитать оригинал данной статьи на русском языке, нажмите сюда. We can rejoice, we have carried out the desire of our powers in full and are getting used to the dispatches from the front like to competitions going on the news before the Olympic games. For now they still tug at the heartstrings, but a few years will go by and just like with the war in Chechnya, we will look with irritation at the latest propagandistic brew ...

Focus Media Holding, Ltd. (FMCN) announced strong growth in revenue and earnings for the second quarter. These results exceeded market expectations, despite the Sichuang Earthquake. In addition, the company’s blended gross margin improved sequentially. Focus Media expects to maintain its growth even after the Beijing Olympic Games.

Focus Media is well positioned to leverage the great growth opportunity of the out-of-home and Internet advertising market in China. The company’s smart business model allows its core business to face limited competition. It is believed that it has more than 90 percent market share in the commercial building network and frame poster network in China.

The company’s revenue from online brand advertising is second only to Sina.com in China. However, we think its current stock price doesn’t reflect the company’s growth prospects. Therefore, we are maintaining Buy recommendation on the stock.

The stock is trading at 15.5x our 2008 EPS estimate, which is lower

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