"50 Million KRW Per Seat at Xi Jinping's Dinner Table"… Fierce Ticket Battle Among US Companies

Dinner with US Businesspeople after Meeting Biden on the 15th
Seeking Expansion of Business in Chinese Market Amid US-China Reconciliation Mood

Amid the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, Chinese President Xi Jinping visited San Francisco, USA, and it is reported that companies are making desperate efforts to secure seats at the dinner on the 15th (local time) to sit at the same table as President Xi. To sit at the same table as President Xi, one must pay a large sum exceeding 50 million Korean won, but even then, fierce competition is taking place to secure a seat.

In a situation where the US and China are fostering a mood of reconciliation, it is interpreted that American companies are making these efforts to seize the opportunity to expand their previously contracted Chinese business. Especially, as major American corporate CEOs and other influential figures are expected to gather at the dinner venue, difficulties in securing tickets to the dinner are also anticipated.

[Image source=AFP Yonhap News]

According to Bloomberg and The New York Times (NYT) on the 14th, the National Committee on United States-China Relations (NCUSCR) and the US-China Business Council (USCBC) will hold a dinner on the 15th attended by President Xi and American corporate executives. This is a meeting between President Xi and American businesspeople following his summit with US President Joe Biden.

A source close to the organizers explained, "The purpose of the dinner is to facilitate smooth communication."

According to the invitation sent by the organizers to companies, the ticket price for attending the dinner is $2,000 (approximately 2.6 million Korean won). To sit at the same table as President Xi, one must pay $40,000 (approximately 52 million Korean won). It is reported that there are only eight such seats available.

Although the ticket price is equivalent to the cost of a car, American companies are reportedly scrambling to obtain tickets to attend the dinner event with President Xi and to get on the waiting list, Bloomberg cited multiple sources. One foreign media outlet explained, "President Xi is visiting the US for the first time in six years, and considering past cases of Chinese leaders visiting the US, this is at a routine level."

The reason participants are eager to engage in conversation with President Xi is to appeal for expanding their business in China. Despite the US taking a tough stance on China, attendees seem to want to convey to President Xi that their companies consider the Chinese market important and are interested in it.

Jude Blanchette, Honorary Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), told the NYT, "This movement by the Chinese government and American companies sends a signal that China remains an attractive place to do business," adding, "The fact that many companies are flocking to meet and dine with President Xi is evidence of that."

However, there are also voices in the US Congress criticizing the act of paying excessive amounts of money to meet with China, which has human rights issues. Mike Gallagher, Chairman of the US House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party, mentioned the Xinjiang Uyghur genocide and criticized, "It is unscrupulous for American companies to pay thousands of dollars for a 'welcome dinner' hosted by Chinese Communist Party officials," and called for an investigation into the organizers NCUSCR and USCBC.

Meanwhile, separate from the dinner, a CEO Summit will be held from the 14th to the 16th during the APEC summit. Attendees include Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla; Jane Fraser, CEO of Citigroup; Darren Woods, CEO of ExxonMobil; and Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft (MS). Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, who visited Beijing last month and met with Commerce Minister Wang Wentao, will not attend the APEC event and will send a government relations officer instead.

President Xi arrived in San Francisco, where the APEC summit is being held, in the afternoon of the day and will hold a summit with US President Joe Biden on the 15th. This is their first meeting in a year. On the day before the summit, President Biden told reporters at the White House, "We are not trying to decouple (separate supply chains, etc.) from China," and expressed his intention to improve relations, saying, "What we are trying to do is to make the relationship better."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.