off toa off to a snappy start — social media company snap inc surges on the sharemarket debut. and as the chinese super league prepares to kickoff, we explain why it has become football's latest financial superpower. welcome to asia business report. many of you would have heard of it, snapchat, an app popular among teenagers and well known for the quirky video features as well. now it is the tech listing of the year. shares of the company behind the app went 44% up when they listed, in the largest share sale from a tech company since china's alibaba three years ago. earlier, i spoke with dave lee. it has gone very well. they could have sold the shares several times over if they wa nted shares several times over if they wanted to. they began the day at $17. it was above what many thought the price would be. in the course of the price would be. in the course of the day it rose to $26.05. at the close of market, it is $211.48. so, very impressive for snap. we have seen this before. we have seen technology companies have this blistering debut. sometimes it lives up blistering debut. sometimes it lives up to the hype. sometimes not. facebook whipped up to the hype. you will remember twitter have a huge debut with shares rising 100% on the first day but it didn't turn out well in the long run. people are asking if it will be more like facebook or twitter. crucial question. i am sure that people are looking to the future of the company. even though snapchat is incredibly popular with young people, it hasn't made any money. yes, and the losses are widening. the hope is, as you mentioned, with the young audience, that it is very lucrative to advertisers. the more that they can grow the user base, 150 million at the moment, the more they can grow that the more advertisers will be on board. that will be the main way to make money. now, the threat they face, however, is from companies like facebook, who owns instagram, which is a popular messaging app, and they have been pinching some of snapchat‘s best ideas, which you could only do on snapchat, and you can do it on instagram as well now. there is concern from investors and the company of snap themselves that users will migrate from one service to another, so the challenge is to stay relevant, stay cool, the place where young people want to be, and turn that popularity into advertising money. gaming on the go is the latest strategy from the japanese firm nintendo, which is betting that its console, the switch, will be an industry favourite, so what is so special? if you are in the middle of a game at home and you have to leave the house, you can take it with you and continue to play the same game, so is it all a gimmick or will gamers decide it is a function that they never knew that they needed? earlier, i asked an analyst if it will be a hit. it is a success. we have seen demand from gamers. the success of pokemon go, gamers want nintendo in their homes or on the go. and is it a step up from some of the other games we have seen from nintendo? they have the hugely successful pokemon go, and they also had game consoles like the wii. how is it different, will it be better? good question, so the wii has sold only about one third of the ps4, and with the wii, it has been a great success. it was also risky. gamers love risk and innovation. nintendo is at its best when they innovate. the feature with the switch, where you can have it on the go or at home, is fantastic, and i think gamers will love it. use the word innovate, which is key amongst these gaming they have to keep gamers excited but there is competition from xbox, playstation, so how can the switch stack up? quite well. we think that given the demand for pokemon go, gamers will nintendo. now, the risk is there are not many third—party games so far for the platform. however, i have confidence that gamers want first party mario and other games like zelda. there has been criticism that some games are not available on the switch. that is correct. there are always bugs to start with. sony back with p53 bugs to start with. sony back with ps3 had problems, the same with microsoft, with the xbox 360, they had problems with the red ring of death. half of consoles sold had a problem, so the fact nintendo has only a few games at the launch isn't a big deal. sam reynolds speaking earlier. japan's core consumer price rose for the first time in a year in january because of a pickup in energy costs and private consumption. the core consumer price index, which includes oil products but excludes volatile fresh food prices, rose 0.1%. forthe but excludes volatile fresh food prices, rose 0.1%. for the first time, bitcoin exceeded the value of an alp of gold, which is seen as a safe haven investment, in a major reversal for safe haven investment, in a major reversalfor bitcoin, which plummeted in 2014 after the largest exchange collapsed. and a us law enforcement official is conducting a probe into heavy machine manufacturer caterpillar, pumping a sell—off in stock. caterpillar believe the search is pa rt caterpillar believe the search is part of a revenue service investigation related to profits earned by a swiss path subsidiary caterpillar sarl. the chinese super league football season the chinese super league football season kicks off today. in 14 years it has gone from minnow to major power in the world's most popular sport, and you might ask how? quite simply cash, and a lot of it, with players being offered as much as $730,000 per week, which is leading many stars to swap the likes of sevilla and shanghai. messi wasn't available, so here is robin brant to explain what is behind the big spending. first, a history lesson. the chinese super league was formed in 2004 when the game went pro and there are 16 teams, the team in the south guangzhou are the league leaders. let's talk about the money. it is the only thing the csl is really known for. they are big spenders. $200 million in the last transfer window. $41 million a year to get carlos tevez in shanghai, apparently. that makes him the best paid player on the planet. there is no transparency. no one knows whether money is coming from. plenty of big firms are behind the clubs, most of with government links. so, what about the government links? well, being good in football in china is now government policy, and this is the man with a whistle, the president xijinping, he this is the man with a whistle, the president xi jinping, he wants his country to host and win a world cup in 2030, which is quite a big ask, having only qualified once before in 2002, currently ranked 86 in the world, tucked in between qatar and kenya. so, what about the plan to get better at football? it all sta rts get better at football? it all starts here at the grassroots. the government wants 20,000 football schools by next year producing it hopes 100,000 home—grown chinese football talent in the years ahead. the problem for the super league is it is dominated by foreigners, they win all of the awards, the golden boot foremost also scored, most valuable player, so there will be a limit of having three of them on the field at any one time during the game. —— for most goals scored. that is your guide to the chinese super league, which kicks off this weekend, now, what some football. —— watch some football. i will watch messi but we also have oui’ i will watch messi but we also have our very and robin brant. let's have a look at the markets because there is time to tell you that they are all down and in fact australia had quite a big sell—off down 1%, the biggest in a month, following on from wall street's losses, and that is it for this edition of asia business report. thanks for watching. the top stories this hour: the us attorney general, jeff sessions, has denied lying over his contact with russians in last year's election campaign but said he'll sit out any investigation. thousands of ordinary chinese people are being blocked from seeking justice ahead of the annual national people's congress in beijing. the chief inspector of hospitals in england has given a stark warning about the state of the nhs, saying it's standing on a, "burning platform," with four out of five trusts needing to improve patient safety. professor sir mike richards says the traditional model of caring for patients is no longer capable of meeting the needs of today's population. 0ur health editor hugh pym has the story. i'll bring your baby across and let you know about the checks we are going to do on him today. a new birth today and a new beginning for this hospital in cambridge. maternity and other services were rated inadequate by the regulator, the care quality commission, in 2015. the trust, which includes addenbrooke's, was put into special measures, but now it's tackled the problems and is rated "good". it was a very big shock for our patients. the boss who helped steer the hospital from the low point of special measures back to where it should be, told me how they went about it. the wider leadership teams invested a huge amount of their time, you know, in some cases well over two days a week, in going out to frontline clinical areas and talking to staff and listening to them and listening to patients about what needed to improve in the organisation. the care quality commission makes clear that while there are successful turnarounds like at this hospital, there are others where there is cause for concern and where care is still falling short. the cqc report said across major hospital trusts in england, 68% were rated as inadequate or needing improvement. 81% was said to need to improve safety but 93% were praised for the caring attitude of staff. but those ratings were done before this winter's extreme pressure in hospitals and the cqc says the whole system needs a complete overhaul. of course i have concerns about what has been happening and i think we need to take a long look at that to see what more can be done in terms of improving the acute care model, from emergency admissions, through the hospital, through to discharge. so we need to look across the country at all of those things. but some hospitals are managing it better than others. the system as a whole is under strain but for some hospitals the mood is more relaxed — those who having had a bad inspection have turned things around and got high marks for patient care. hugh pym bbc news. hello. this is sport today, live from the bbc sport centre. coming up on this programme: spanish international, fernando torres, taken to hospital after suffering a head injury against deportivo la coruna. andy murray saves seven match points, as he sneaks into the dubai championships semi—finals. and british cycling lurches further into crisis after admitting "failings" within the organisation. hello, and welcome to the programme, where it's spain's primera division where we start, and the news that atletico madrid and spain striker, fernando torres, has been taken to hospital after a heavy collision in their 1—1 draw away to deportivo la coruna. torres and deportivo's alex bergantinos went up for the ball five minutes from the end of the match. the 32—year—old appeared to lose consciousness and landed head first on the turf with players from both sides racing to his aid before medical staff attended to him and removed him from the field on a stretcher where he was taken to hospital. the club have tweeted since torres was taken to hospital, saying this. "torres suffers a head injury. he was rushed to the hospital to undergo tests. he will spend the night in hospital for observation." and then this.