SINGAPORE — Shares of groups related to South Korean-conglomerate Samsung Group plunged on Monday after Samsung heir Jay. Y Lee was sentenced to two and a half years in jail by a South Korean court on Monday.

By Monday’s market close in South Korea, shares of industry heavyweight Samsung Electronics fell 3.41%. after dipping more than 4% earlier in the session.

Samsung C&T’s stock also saw heavy losses, and dropped 6.84%. Meanwhile, Samsung SDI declined 4.21% while Samsung Heavy Industries fell 2.74%. and Samsung Life Insurance slipped 4.96%.

Samsung related shares dragged down South Korea’s broader index, and the Kospi fell 2.33% by the close of the trading day.

Lee’s return to prison came after a retrial of a bribery case involving former President Park Geun-hye, according to local news agency Yonhap.

“In this case, a company’s freedom and right to wealth were violated due to the abuse of power by the former president,” Lee’s lead attorney said in a statement given by Samsung Electronics, according to a CNBC translation.

The 52-year-old Samsung scion was unexpectedly freed from jail in 2018 after a South Korean appeals court suspended his prior jail sentence. He was previously charged with giving 29.8 billion Korean won (around $27 million) worth of bribes and promising to give more, Yonhap reported.

Former president Park recently had her 20-year prison sentence on graft charges upheld, according to Reuters.

— CNBC’s Chery Kang contributed to this report.

SINGAPORE — China will impose sanctions on U.S. officials who displayed “nasty” behavior over the issue of Taiwan, the Chinese foreign ministry said on Monday.

The decision was revealed by the foreign ministry’s spokewoman, Hua Chunying, in response to a reporter’s question on what China would do in response to the U.S. lifting restrictions on its relations with Taiwan.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had earlier this month announced that his country will no longer limit contact between its officials and their Taiwanese counterparts. China slammed the decision and vowed to fight back.

China claims Taiwan — a democratic and self-ruled island — as its territory that must one day be reunited with the mainland, and insists that the island has no right to participate in international diplomacy of its own. The Chinese Communist Party has never governed Taiwan.

Experts have warned that Taiwan will remain a contentious issue in the bilateral ties between the U.S. and China. Former Australian Kevin Rudd, a long-time China watcher, told CNBC last week that Pompeo’s move could upend a major foundation underpinning U.S.-China relations.

Rudd was referring to the “one China policy,” the principle in which the U.S. and the international community recognize that there’s only one central Chinese government — under the Communist Party of China in Beijing.

GUANGZHOU, China — Chinese electric carmaker Xpeng Motors has announced a new autonomous driving feature designed to work on highways, as it ramps up its challenge to domestic rivals as well as Tesla.

The feature — called Navigation Guided Pilot or NGP — will allow the company’s flagship P7 sedan to automatically change lanes, speed up or slow down, or overtake cars and enter and exit highways.

It is part of the next generation of Xpeng’s XPILOT 3.0 so-called advanced driver-assistance system (ADAS) which the company expects to launch in the first quarter of this year. ADAS refers to a system with some autonomous features but where a driver is still required.

Xpeng is one of China’s electric vehicle start-ups looking to race ahead in the country’s growing market as it battles other upstarts such as Nio and Li Auto, as well as U.S. electric car giant Tesla.

Mass deliveries of Xpeng’s P7 sedan, a direct rival to Tesla’s Model 3, began last June. Xpeng delivered 27,041 vehicles in 2020 — more than double from a year ago. 

The NGP is a challenge to Tesla’s autonomous ADAS called Autopilot. One of Autopilot’s features is called Navigate on Autopilot, which has similar functions to Xpeng’s NGP.

China’s electric vehicle companies are looking to add more autonomous features to their cars. Nio has its own system called NIO Pilot.

Xpeng says its cars are equipped with 14 cameras and other critical sensors. Nvidia‘s Xavier computing system powers XPILOT 3.0.

The highway driving feature will be available on the premium version of the P7 and available to customers in China only.