There is a good YouTube show on the overbuilt, and vacant, Chinese real estate market.
Looks like a tremendous problem. At some point you become the last buyer and are left holding the bag.
1 Like
Not to mention the unemployed workers and subcontractors who have been going gangbusters for the last 20 years. Lots of layers to the problems.
Xi’s worst fear is civil unrest
2 Likes
Plus in China, you can’t own the land. Just the building. Not true real estate.
Re: Dalio
I read investor Ray Dalio’s new book “Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order”.
Ray identifies recurring themes in the rise & fall of world-dominant empires over the last 500 years—from the Dutch to the British then to the US (now in decline) & China (ascendant).
He has a good YouTube video that covers the book’s main points — https://youtu.be/xguam0TKMw8
I found especially useful the video’s discussion of reserve currencies (@ 24:24, 29:25, 32:00 marks) and the money printing it enables.
At 37:12 he states less than 20% of the roughly 750 currencies that existed since 1700 remain & they are all devalued.
I like Ray’s Twitter feed—here’s a recent tweet—“There are no greater battles than those between our feelings (most importantly controlled by our amygdala, which operates subconsciously) and our rational thinking (most importantly controlled by our prefrontal cortex, which operates consciously).”
Back in the early 90s it was all the rage that Japan and Germany were going to supplant the United States. Everyone was scrambling to mimic their way of doing business and their way of interacting with employees.
Funny thing happened on the way to supplanting the United States.
China is Enron. A criminal organization backed up with fraudulent accounting.
3 Likes
Don’t count America out. Real problem I have is us getting involved in foreign countries affairs and meddling. George Washington was right don’t get involved in alliances. Stay armed to teeth dare anyone to mess with us should be our policy. Stay engaged with the world on a limited basis. Be the shining city on the hill. Got 2 huge oceans to protect us, except against ICBM 's. Mind our own business. Take care of our people. Do trade with any all, except military armaments.
Yea, remember our companies wanting us to have meetings standing up,doing jumping jacks, and that kitsch behavioral crap.
1 Like
You are right about nobody knows what will happen. $9 trillion is 6 times Chinese GDP.
What is your source for China’s GDP ? This site puts it at 14 trillion.
Top Ten Countries by Nominal GDP at Current U.S. Dollar Exchange Rates
Country Nominal GDP (in trillions) PPP Adjusted GDP (in trillions) Annual Growth (%) GDP Per Capita (in thousands)
United States $20.89 $20.89 -3.6% $63,413.5
China $14.72 $24.27 2.3% $10,434.8
Japan $5.06 $5.25 -4.6% $40,193.3
Germany $3.85 $4.52 -4.6% $46,208.4
United Kingdom $2.76 $3.08 -9.7%
This is in my opinion very scary:
Russian State TV Threatens Nuclear Attack On Europe (msn.com)
The Kremlin controls the TV stations. This is what Putin is thinking.
US GDP 1990 about $6 trillion
Japan GDP 1990 about $3 trillion
So back then, from GDP perspective, they were roughly 50% of US and toyota and nissan
had already made huge inroads into US auto industry( that actually happened probably 10-15 years prior)
Today, China is about 2/3 size of US GDP. So similar fears, but China is much different
animal with that 1.2 billion population and growing military then the Japan of 1990. And most stuff at Walmart is stamped “Made in China”. Hard to predict the future. History repeats itself or turning of a new page in history ?
Sometimes I’m wrong. Good catch. Or I could fight you to the death defending data pulled from the recesses of my elderly and declining brain. 
The bigger point still valid I think; 9 trillion debt is about 64% of their economy. Not
a small number at all.
That number is huge and would drag down any economy. Possibly the world econonmic system. The Communist are definitely afraid of having negative growth as any government would be. Bad economy can bring social upheaval. That they don’t want
Here is Ray Dalio’s update on the Ukraine war which he sees as the 1st battle between the current, U.S.-centric World Order and the next one — How Can We Tell How the First Battle in the Long War for Control of the World Order Is Going? — via LinkedIn
He has an interesting indicator scoring system to keep track of who the winner may be…
He’s betting on China
1 Like
Who are you betting on?
USA
You?
Same
This from Kyle Bass on twiiter. He is the most anti-China investment guy out there…
Another take on China’s shutdown of Shanghai, Shenzhen, Guangdong, etc. China is desperately in need of crude oil, LNG, food, basic materials, base metals, and more. Putin’s invasion/massacre has created additional energy scarcity, inflation, and skyrocketing food inflation.
Whilst China hasn’t had any material problems with the virus from Wuhan in the past, it’s interesting that their draconian lockdowns (in conjunction with telegraphing the purchase of fewer cargos of LNG and crude) are forcing global economists to ratchet growth expectations
lower whilst concurrently shifting future demand projections for commodities lower. Everything China desperately needs to acquire is trading down in price as a result of the lockdowns. If we all take a look back, the primary driver of China’s current account moving into negative territory happened to be the Chinese citizens traveling and spending abroad(they could only spend USD, EUR, YEN, etc).COVID abruptly halted Chinese travel,gave the CPC supreme censorship power (Chinese travelers no longer open to uncensored internet) and allowed a crushing takeover of Hong Kong without further incident (COVID appeared at the zenith of HK protests). Either the occurrences of COVID are perfectly coincidental (and incredibly helpful to the CPC’s existential crises) or a much more insidious modus operandi
is at work. Remember, rampant food price inflation was one key grievance that led to the Tiananmen Square protests/massacre as well as the Arab Spring. It’s too late for Xi and the world to avoid the food price spike as it will certainly worsen next year given input pricing. Economic slowdown projecting will be pushed to Wall St economists by the CPC on one hand while positive speeches by the likes of Liu He are designed to keep Chinese stocks from resuming their free fall. Think about the LME nickel disaster. China’s largest nickel trader, Aka “Big Shot” had/has the largest short position in nickel on the exchange. It’s widely accepted that nickel is (and will continue to be) in a global deficit due to the insatiable demand for nickel-rich batteries in EVs and Russian production being removed from the market. Why would China’s largest nickel producer/trader have such an enormous short position if he can’t deliver into the expiry? Is China manipulating nickel prices lower in an effort to keep a cap on them? China’s HKEX bought the 152 yr-old London Metal Exchange(LME) in 2012. The LME sale to a Chinese entity should have been blocked for obvious reasons. The trading halt, the cancellation of over $4 billion of trades, and the subsequent investigation into the BUYERS all smells like a corrupt investigation with Chinese characteristics. Remember, it was the giant short position of China’s largest nickel trader/producer that refused to pay margin calls (along with China Construction Bank). A comprehensive review of China’s actions begins to look like a beautiful mosaic of controlled manipulation of global Commodity markets. In the long run, I believe that it will pay in spades 
to be long all of the commodities China is insidiously manipulating lower. Today’s prices have all of this factored in. #ChinaExposed #China #oil #nickel @AmbQinGang
1 Like