Welcome to Your Week in Asia.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations is hosting a series of top-level meetings which will gather leaders from across the globe.
Semicon Taiwan, an annual premier event for the global chip industry, will be held from Wednesday to Friday.
China is set to announce trade and inflation statistics for August. Recent data releases have pointed to a weakness in the world's second largest economy.
At the weekend, U.S. President Joe Biden will attend this year's G20 summit in India and make a brief stop in Vietnam.
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MONDAY
ASEAN Business & Investment Summit
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will join the leaders of Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam to address the second day of the ASEAN Business & Investment Summit in Jakarta. The two-day summit also features top executives of major companies in the region, including Singapore Telecommunications, Temasek Holdings and VinFast.
TUESDAY
ASEAN Summit in Jakarta
ASEAN leaders will convene in Jakarta for their second summit this year. The Myanmar crisis is expected to continue to cloud the gathering, as the bloc is seeking to strengthen regional economic integration and unify different voices over issues such as energy transition financing, food security and the use of local currencies.
ASEAN Indo-Pacific Forum
The ASEAN Indo-Pacific Forum is a flagship event under Indonesia's chairmanship of the ASEAN. The two-day forum, starting on Tuesday, seeks to mobilize public and private funding to support economic developments in the region. It will be attended by leaders of the bloc and some of its partner countries, who will discuss topics including green infrastructure, supply chain resilience, the digital transformation, as well as sustainable and innovative financing.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will attend the forum from Wednesday.
Monetary policy: Australia
WEDNESDAY
ASEAN Plus Three Summit
ASEAN leaders convene with their counterparts from three partner countries: China, Japan and South Korea. Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping are not attending and will instead be represented by U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and Chinese Premier Li Qiang.
Semicon Taiwan
The annual Semicon Taiwan -- one of the most important events for the semiconductor industry -- will take place for three days, from Wednesday to Friday, on the democratically-ruled island, home to the world's second-largest chip industry after the U.S. Its most-anticipated CEO summit on Wednesday will feature keynote speeches from the top executives of large suppliers, including Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Chairman Mark Liu, Tien Wu, CEO of the world's biggest chip packaging and testing supplier ASE, and major American chip equipment maker Lam Research's CEO and President Tim Archer. The expo comes as the Netherlands, a key chip production tool supplier, has just begun its new export controls on advanced semiconductor production equipment, a blow to China's ambition to build a self-reliant chip industry.
GDP: Australia Q2
THURSDAY
East Asia Summit
Leaders of the ASEAN and eight partner countries -- Australia, China, India, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea, Russia and the U.S. -- will convene. Biden and Xi will skip the summit, while Russian President Vladimir Putin is expected to be represented by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
China trade data
China releases external trade figures for August amid growth pressure due to sluggish global and domestic demand. Both the export and import order sub-indexes under last month's purchasing managers index -- a gauge on factory activity -- grew marginally but remained below the 50-point mark that distinguishes contraction from an expansion.
Monetary policy: Malaysia
FRIDAY
GDP: Japan Q2 (revised)
WEEKEND
G20 in New Delhi
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is set to host Group of 20 leaders for the annual summit of the intergovernmental forum in New Delhi. Biden has already confirmed his participation while Putin, in a late August phone call with Modi, conveyed his inability to take part in the two-day weekend summit, where Moscow will be again represented by Lavrov.
While speculation is rife about Xi skipping the meeting and Premier Li Qiang representing Beijing instead, those who are expected to travel to India include Japan's Kishida, the U.K.'s Sunak, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, French President Emmanuel Macron, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and South Korean leader Yoon Suk Yeol. Ahead of the summit, several G20 ministerial meetings were held in India which ended without a joint communique as Russia and China objected to inclusion of references to Moscow's war in Ukraine.
Maldives presidential election
The Maldives goes to the polls for a presidential election on Saturday, with incumbent Ibrahim Mohamed Solih facing a field of seven challengers. The outcome of the vote in the strategically located Indian Ocean archipelago, known for its picturesque resorts, is sure to be closely watched by two powers that have long sought influence there -- India and China. The pro-New Delhi Solih will be looking to fend off rivals including Mohamed Muiz, the nominee for the main opposition People's National Congress, whose pro-Beijing leader, former President Abdullah Yameen, was barred from running due to a jail sentence for corruption.
Biden visits Vietnam
While he is in Asia, Biden will squeeze in a one-day trip to the Vietnamese capital Hanoi as his government pushes to upgrade formal diplomatic ties with a country that is key to China-U.S. competition. Vietnam's communist party boss Nguyen Phu Trong and other leaders will host Biden for talks on the economy, technology and the climate.
