Foundations
The Framework
The method the whole series runs on. Why the Smil-Rosling synthesis is the analytical engine of Plain Sight Research — and why it keeps producing China.
The Electrostate Series
The Electrostate Series
Britain's industrial revolution ran on coal it owned. The American century ran on petroleum it controlled. China is assembling the first economy whose energy base is electricity it manufactures rather than fuel it extracts — and then selling the capability. Three parts: building the supply stack at home, becoming a fully electrified economy, and exporting the whole stack to the Global South.
Part 1
Building the Electrostate
The supply side, assembled — generation, storage, transmission, and a nuclear fleet built at a cost the petrostate can no longer compete with.
Part 2
Coming soon
Becoming the Electrostate
The demand side. What it takes to cross over — when an economy stops burning fuel and starts running on the electricity it builds.
Part 3
Coming soon
Exporting the Electrostate
The stack as an export. Sovereign-grade energy infrastructure, sold to the Global South as an integrated package — and what that buys, on both ends.
Earlier articles
The Scorecard: Alibaba Q4 FY2026
My quarterly prediction was a disaster. The quarter itself was the strongest forward guidance Eddie Wu has ever given. Cloud margins are better than we modeled.
The Dark Matter of AI in China
China's AI programme didn't start with DeepSeek. It started in 2016, with Demis Hassabis. R1 was the visible flame. The wildfire is AI for materials.
Solar, Batteries and…Hauling Rocks?
Chinese miners expanded copper 16% and gold 43% during the supercycle. Western majors contracted 18–60%. The reason isn't state policy.
The Oil Surplus Nobody Is Modeling
Permanent structural surplus by 2028–2029. Five demand-destruction forces the consensus underestimates. A Hormuz conflict accelerates the timeline; it doesn't reverse it.
If China Leads in Solar, Why Is It Building More Coal?
Three answers to the coal question. The third one — coal-to-olefins — is the thesis nobody in Western energy markets has priced.
Swimming With the Current: Alibaba at $124
A $295B megacap trading at 40–45% of fair value. Cloud growing 36%. The algorithm reads collapse; it's actually a pivot.
Reading Words: What the 15th Five-Year Plan Actually Says
The FYP as deployment order, not speculative bet. Why TFP is China's new organizational scorecard.
The IEA Error: Why Every China Forecast Is Wrong in the Same Direction
China export consensus misses 2024–2026. The same structural misforecast the IEA made on solar, applied to trade surplus.