By reading coverage in Nikkei and analysts that are on the ground in China. Notably Dan Wang, who totally called it 8 months ago:

https://danwang.co/2020-letter/

> While promoting the status of science and technology with one hand, the Chinese government has with its other hand reined in the activities of consumer internet companies. I’ve never stopped lamenting the marketing trick that California pulled off to situate consumer internet as the highest form of technology, as if Tencent and Facebook are the surest signs that we live a technologically-accelerating civilization. The “tech” giants are highly-capable companies that print cash. But they’re barely engaged in the creation of intellectual property, excelling instead on business-model innovation and the exploitation of network effects. It’s become apparent in the last few months that the Chinese leadership has moved towards the view that hard tech is more valuable than products that take us more deeply into the digital world. Xi declared this year that while digitization is important, “we must recognize the fundamental importance of the real economy… and never deindustrialize.” This expression preceded the passage of securities and antitrust regulations, thus also pummeling finance, which along with tech make up the most glamorous sectors today. The optimistic scenario is that these actions compress the wage and status premia of the internet and finance sectors, such that we’ll see fewer CVs that read: “BS Microelectronics, Peking; software engineer, Airbnb” or “PhD Applied Mathematics, Princeton; VP, Citibank.”

Read the whole letter, it is very informative, unlike most coverage in the Western business press that leans towards the caricatural. Xi may be evil and ruthless, but that does not mean he is stupid, or insincere in his nationalism. It would be a grave mistake to underestimate him and think of him as just another Putin.

It’s a good read but I find it pretty bias as well. I certainly don’t think Xi is stupid though. He has shown time and time again to be a good strategist, even if you don’t like his ruthlessness.

He's a Chinese-Canadian who lives in China and works as an analyst for an investment research firm. What you think of bias may simply be a different perspective from someone who is actually on the ground there.

Coverage of China in the US business press is abysmal, which is kind of surprising given how important the bilateral relationship is, but then again the US is so big, so central to the world economy and so powerful it could survive for a long time with an insular point of view, a luxury it no longer has. You will get much better coverage in Japan's Nikkei, and in specialized blogs.

I tried to take your comment seriously, but 'tech companies that might take power away' part made me laugh. What do you think those tech companies are? Their most advanced technology is a chat app and an online mall.

Influence public opinion, destabilize the financial system

That would be a quick route to the firing squad. As Mao wrote, all power flows from the barrel of a gun, and his student Xi Jinping took copious notes.

Influence public opinion might be plausible.

but destalizie the financial system would be undesirable by any government, hardly to say it's a CCP problem.

Undesirable enough to be taken seriously then (not laughable)? Nobody said it had to be intentional.

The treatment of Alibaba and Ant group is enough to reach the conclusion that Xhi Jing Ping doesnt think highly of these companies. They do add value but these are middlemen companies that part is correct, but that isnt the reason for this clampdown. I think that with the rise of Charismatic Entrepreneurs who have millions of followers both nationally and internationally they command a lot of followign and respect which directly threatens and undermines the Supreme leader. That may not be acceptable to CCP, as it poses a threat to long term viability of CCP, the future is technology driven and thus would be more and more important to the future of the nation and of its people, such decisions in CCP's mind cannot be left to the private sector. If they do China may turn into Oligarchy like Russia or a seemingly democratic Oligarchy like US.

It's all of the above. A large, unproductive rentier class creating a barrier to capitalist dynamics contributes to a stagnant economy, which generates popular discontent and erodes government authority.

> I’m not sure how you arrived at this conclusion. My take away was the Chinese government fears tech companies that might take power away from the Chinese government. This is more about the Chinese government maintaining its own power and full control, and less about the value add or anti trust stance for keeping a competitive market.

I keep the claim that the explanation is even more simpler: whomever becomes a big man in a country like China eventually goes down, and that's the whole story.

There can only be one "big man" in such system, and he tolerates no competition.

This consistently held true through the whole 40 years of modern China: whomever attains too much of the social, political, economical, cultural, moral, or even genealogical prominence consistently gets taken down. This is why most mainland Chinese have that fear of publicity, and standing out almost bordering on panic disorder. And this is why people attaining any level of prominence there keep leaving the country for the West.

There are other areas where the Chinese government is cracking down on improductive activity that is harmful to the economy without challenging the CCP's power, like real estate, bitcoin miners or most recently EdTech.

"Activity that is harmful to the economy?" I think they get much more glaring issues to care about if it comes to this.

What about their wrong simply being "getting too rich, and successful," and causing somebody a burst of jealousy?

Becoming richer than a partyman in some small village is very much a challenge to the party. What changed now is that the entire China has become that village.