Sales of SUVs soared 52% last year. That helped the overall market grow 7.3% even though car and minivan sales fell. “Ten years ago, no one wanted an SUV because it was considered to be a bulky truck for peasants,” said Michael Dunne, Consultant on Chinese auto market strategy. “Now the cool factor has kicked in and SUVs are super-hot in the China market.” Scrambling for a piece of that action, automakers from General Motors and Volkswagen to local players Great Wall and BYD are making SUVs the star of this week’s Beijing auto show, the biggest of the year in the world’s biggest auto market. The show “will highlight the growing tension between international and local brands as they fight to outshine each other with new products,” said Namrita Chow of IHS Automotive in a report. Overall auto sales growth is likely to fall further this year to 6%, though total volume might reach 25 million vehicles. Total profit for Chinese brands fell last year despite a 10% sales growth, said Robin Zhu of Bernstein Research. Chinese brands account for 65% of SUVs sold, dominating the market’s lowest tiers, where profits are slim. This month, BYD Auto unveiled the Yuan compact SUV, starting at CNY59,000 for the gasoline version and CNY209,900 for a gas-electric hybrid. Also ahead of the Beijing show, Geely debuted the Boyue SUV, starting at CNY98,800. Fiat Chrysler Automobiles’ Jeep is due to debut its China-manufactured Renegade, while Honda Motor Co plans to unveil two SUVs designed for China, the Shanghai Daily reports.

A depreciation of nearly 3% in the yuan against a basket of foreign currencies is considered a “stable” performance, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) said. SAFE is taking a tolerant attitude, with the yuan being allowed to fluctuate within an acceptable range. The yuan has weakened by 2.8% against the basket, which comprises 13 currencies referenced by the central bank. In the first quarter, the yuan appreciated against the U.S. dollar but fell against the basket. Its nominal effective exchange rate fell by 2.3% against 40 currencies defined by the Bank for International Settlement (BIS). The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) in recent months has moved between depegging the yuan to the dollar and repegging it to the U.S. currency when market confidence in the yuan slumped. Tom Orlik, Economist at Bloomberg said: “The worst fears of a cascading capital flight have come to pass. There appears to have been a repegging of the yuan against the dollar since mid-January, which reduces the incentive for households to shift funds out of China’s currency,” the China Daily reports.

Chinese authorities are suspending new registrations of finance companies. Applicants with finance-related names or businesses would not be able to register via local branches of the State Administration for Industry and Commerce (SAIC). The companies first need to get approvals from financial regulators. The Administration has also started targeting “financial” companies involved in illegal activities such as illicit public fundraising, loan sharking schemes and defrauding investors via online peer-to-peer platforms. Law enforcement authorities, including police, have already teamed up with business-registration authorities to raid some of the illegal operations. The decision to suspend approvals comes after a string of failures of P2P operators and asset management firms since late last year. The firms were alleged to have illegally taken deposits or defrauded investors. Victims of the biggest scam so far, run by a P2P platform called Ezubao, took to the streets and protested, saying the authorities turned a blind eye to the schemes until state financial regulators and law enforcement authorities became aware of the risks from the business failures. Police are expecting a large number of defaults from the illegal private lending and wealth management sector in the middle of this year as due dates for payments fall.

Foreign direct investment (FDI) in China is expected to maintain steady growth this year due to robust inflows in western regions, according to the Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM). “It may not increase very fast but will maintain the growth momentum seen last year and in the first quarter of this year,” said Ministry Spokesman Shen Danyang. Investment in western regions rose 42.5% year-on-year to CNY21.3 billion, a higher growth than the national average. For China as a whole, FDI in the first three months rose 4.5% from a year earlier to CNY224.2 billion, while the figure for March alone was 7.8%. Foreign direct investment in the form of M&As increased by 32.6% year-on-year in the quarter to USD7.8 billion, or 22.7% of the total figure, up from 17.9% a year earlier, he said. The total number of foreign-invested M&A deals in 2015 rose 14.4% year-on-year to 1,466, with realized investment soaring 137% to USD17.8 billion.

China announced plans for its cargo ships to take the Arctic Northwest Passage route to the north of Canada that will be 30% shorter than the ocean passages traditionally used to connect the northern Atlantic and Pacific oceans through the Panama Canal. Global warming has made the northwest route more navigable. Only one cargo ship, the Canadian vessel Nunavik, has so far made a solo voyage through the Northwest Passage.