UK Telegraph
China's credit bubble has finally popped. The property market is swinging wildly from boom to bust, the cautionary exhibit of a BRIC's dream
that is at last coming down to earth with a thud.
It is hard to obtain good data in China,but something is wrong when the country's Homelink property website can report that new home prices in
Beijing fell 35pc in November from the month before. If this is remotely true, the calibrated soft-landing intended by Chinese authorities has gone
badly wrong and risks spinning out of control.
The growth of the M2 money supply slumped to 12.7pc in November, the lowest in 10 years. New lending fell 5pc on a month-to-month basis. The
central bank has begun to reverse its tightening policy as inflation subsides, cutting the reserve requirement for lenders for the first time since
2008 to ease liquidity strains.
The question is whether the People's Bank can do any better than the US Federal Reserve or Bank of Japan at deflating a credit bubble.
Chinese stocks are flashing warning signs. The Shanghai index has fallen 30pc since May. It is off 60pc from its peak in 2008, almost as much in real
terms as Wall Street from 1929 to 1933.
"Investors are massively underestimating the risk of a hard-landing in China, and indeed other BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China)... a
'Bloody Ridiculous Investment Concept' in my view," said Albert Edwards at Societe Generale.
"The BRICs are falling like bricks and the crises are home-blown, caused by their own boom-bust credit cycles. Industrial production is already
falling in India, and Brazil will soon follow."
"There is so much spare capacity that they will start dumping goods, risking a deflation shock for the rest of the world. It no surpise that China
has just imposed tariffs on imports of GM cars. I think it is highly likely that China will devalue the yuan next year, risking a trade war," he
said.
China's $3.2 trillion foreign reserves have been falling for three months despite the trade surplus. Hot money is flowing out of the country.
"One-way capital inflow or one-way bets on a yuan rise have become history. Our foreign reserves are basically falling every day," said Li Yang,
a former central bank rate-setter.
Cited only in part, there is so much interesting information here that could almost emphasise all of it. Imagine what happens when the illusion of
China being the savior of the global economy comes hitting back to earth in reality? I've seen many of the issues outlined here in the news recently
so its not all that new, but taken together presents a dire picture of the Chinese problem. A fitting conclusion to the article:
In truth, China faces an epic deleveraging hangover, like the rest of us.
Another development in China is civil unrest breaking out here and there. This is about government selling land of which the
Chinese are protesting against: 
