teams manchester city's owners not proper chinese thirty a club to get a slice of china's fast growing football market. this is business asia and the double younger out of as welcome to pounce exports have seen their biggest drop in more than two years as the u.s. chinee china trade war puts the brakes on demand for japanese electronics cars and heavy equipment in their january japan exported goods worth fifty billion dollars and that's almost nine percent less than the previous year on the whole the data paints a picture of an export oriented economy that's shifting down to a lower gear of growth cars one of the biggest export hits for the world's third largest economy but recently far fewer hundreds toyota's in exams are being sold around the world the same goes for japanese electronics chemicals and machinery. exports from japan were largely stable last year but in january of this year they were down eight point four percent on the same month in twenty eighteen that

represents the biggest drop in two years and is bad news for the export orientated japanese economy the main reason is the serious weakening of growth in china is japan's most important trading partner and a slowdown there inevitably leads to chinese companies and business people buying fewer japanese products exports to china have slumped by as much as seventeen percent and there's little hope of domestic sales in japan helping to counterbalance the decline for october the government in tokyo is planning to increase sales tax that means for the japanese people every purchase is going to get more expensive. in russia president vladimir putin has delivered his annual state of the nation address part of the state of that nation as an economy making on the western sanctions russians are being forced to tighten their belts and the country's financial sector seems to be in turmoil as well some of russia's biggest banks can only survive thanks to financial aid from the government w.'s moscow

correspondent. reports from xian's bank and oakridge year are just two of the financial institutions that russia's central bank has stepped in to see decisions that cost millions further losses could be on the horizon reports suggest that some one hundred fifty banks in the country are on the brink of collapse lack of capital is a major problem. from what i have bunkers from truth the central bank maintain strict oversight of the small and medium sized financial institutions but it's more lenient towards the big banks they adopt the principle of too big to fail. if you're creating sort of big deal for you. the central bank traditionally intervenes to prevent the demise of major banks smaller privately owned financial institutions are more likely to lose their licenses if they're too low on cash you let you do this is them of regulation and supervision aims to promote competition strict

oversight encourages competition. or that's. the reality on the ground however is that state owned banks are increasingly lending to state owned companies the effect of all this is to dampen economic growth western sanctions which make it hard for russian banks to access international markets have compounded the problem. but the reality is that we're in the midst of a recession it's not western sanctions that are the cause they simply make the situation worse. particularly the countries increasingly shaky financial institutions are causing people to lose faith in the system recent surveys suggest that one in three russians believe they're best off not parking their money in the bank for more now let's cross over to w.w. correspondent allen tilton who's standing by for us in moscow and the government in

russia is spending billions of taxpayer rubles to keep the banks afloat how big of a problem is that. well financial instability is something that we're we're seeing in all fronts here in russia now as we heard there in that report some one hundred fifty banks are actually estimated to be facing insolvency and a lot of the complaints we're hearing from both investors and also financial experts is that the government stimulus in order to help these banks isn't really being doled out by free using free market principles rather it's based on political interests a lot of people are complaining that they're instead focusing on banks that are close to i say the the arms industry as opposed to a lot of the banks that some of these small and medium companies depend on the net result is that in a lot of the regions outside of the major of metropolitan areas outside of moscow and st petersburg many of these small independent companies don't really have access to the financial markets they need in order to keep their doors open their lights on it and you've been to put his press conference earlier today has he

actually addressed in his speech to the what's the state of the nation has he actually addressed the economic issues the state of the banks well he definitely focused on economic issues and economic development but he didn't necessarily touch the banks as much as some observers would like him and said he focused on a lot of the issues that really kind of target russians pocketbooks i mean you have to remember this country has a depressed in qana me it's still not really have been able to develop its economy beyond the petrel state and local mahdi prices and then also the western sanctions are really hampering economic development and that means for a lot of russians that at the end of the month they don't have as much money left over as they'd like to say that was really kind of the the meat of what putin focused on today and less some of the more systematic issues that is kind of hampering the russian economy as a whole. that e.w. business correspondent in moscow thank you. china is known for going on extensive shopping trips across the world buying tech

companies robotics friends and even football clubs but now it seems european football clubs are looking to the chinese soccer leagues to support their own squads they are of english premier league club manchester city said it is planning to take over thirty a team based in showing the city football group hopes the acquisition of sichuan new will give it a foothold in china's developing sports market professional football has been growing in china in recent years attracting high profile players from around the world let's have a closer look at the top division the chinese super league find of this first of all it's made up of sixteen teams from all around the country the most valuable squads in that league are worth millions of dollars the most expensive club is based in one jew and part owned by a billion a mars ali baba group it's thirty seven players have a total market value of more than eighty million dollars not the chinese super

league has been able to attract more and more high profile foreign players as well and that has seen the total value of the really rise dramatically from thirty six million dollars just ten years ago to well over half a billion dollars right now so is football brain child china closer to the rest of the world or is it the other way around let's bring in. my colleague michael de silva from the w.'s sports department michael first my first question is you know. manchester city won a leading football clubs in the world you can even say but why then buy a third tier team in the super league in china is a good question i think the answer is probably potential there is sixteen teams you said all of them or nearly all of them are owned or part by some of the biggest chinese companies and the opportunity for investment is not so high. why basically . in the thirty year. the you know the city of shame do for example has

fourteen point four million people the region is the ferrets not yeah exactly so there's huge potential here. but also i think there's a parallel to be drawn with what we've seen here in germany we've got. a good scene that was bought by the drinks company red bull and they were in the fifth to actually so they did and they've managed to get into the champions league and they're one of the most successful teams in germany in less than a decade so i think potential is the answer and the opportunity for growth is much as it is just looking for a slice of the chinese market or do they have a different agenda as well. the cynical answer is probably that they have a different agenda. i mean firstly the group owns manchester city also owns new york city f.c. melbourne city f.c. so they've invested in some emerging markets less so they have

a track record record in and also they have they've strengthened the game in in those parts of the world so there is there are some of the just a bit reasons for for investing in china but of course they've been accused of circumventing the pay which is financial fair play rules because of. what they've done is they've by buying clubs around the world that is more easy for them to get sponsorship with the likes of see how their ways their biggest sponsor you know any one of these teams because they have it had their ways emblazoned across the us. and in being able to attract sponsorship with companies like that it's easier when you have seven or eight seven or eight teams a stable. but you a furphy physics rules haven't caught up with this yet so it's effectively a loophole is being exploited and. the cynical answer is yes the transport of coming back to china to permit things that one say he wants his country to have one

of the biggest football leagues in the world is that imaginable is that realistic. it's the power is always going to be in europe i think and i think it's always going to be an uphill struggle however he also wants to host the world cup in the years and has pledged for for every ten thousand citizens one football pitch in the country so he has big plans and i was in china in twenty seventeen as well and i saw there is something going on behind the scenes but i think the program has got the young generation is just not really interested they're more interested in the older generation they're interested in table tennis and footloose who is new michael. thank you very much for this very interesting insight. so a spanking has been fined three point seven billion the earth after a french court after a long by a french court after

a long running investigation into tax fraud it's the largest fine for a case of this nature of a dished out in france has been convicted of illegally helping french clients of billions of euros from tax sorties the verdict comes after seven years of investigation after former employees acted as whistle blowers on the matter. from a major business here in the morning and lots of stores to check out the website the. business. world.

mega-cities these concrete jungles are often posting at the sea. their economic power houses get leave people with little to live. half of the world's population already lives in urban centers leaving planners with a huge challenge how can these monstrous cities be taken. made in germany in ninety minutes on d w. sometimes books more exciting than real life. to me. what if there's no escape. list. current most streets. hey listen up. that's what video game music sounded like thirty years ago. today's tracks take the experience to

another level a sense to him composers who play mozart. featured in many games his music is bound to. for his fans he opens doors to. sounds good. oh genre that's so much more than just background music video game music starts february twenty fifth on d w. what's the connection between bread. and the european you. know guild motto e.w. correspondent and the baker crap. ton. and let's go about recipes for success strategies that make a difference. baking bread. d.w.

. play. this. the news coming to you live from berlin the women fleeing abuse. not safe in germany some of the women seeking asylum here say they are still being threatened by their families and. they say the country's embassy in berlin is complicit also coming up.