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China’s property giant Evergrande files for bankruptcy protection in Manhattan

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Re: China’s property giant Evergrande files for bankruptcy protection in Manhattan

#351

Post by cyanydeez »

busterarm wrote: post #271
cyanydeez wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their housing market was a ponzi scheme, in that they took money to build developments, but used that money to market new development. Local authorities got their cuts by rezoning areas. Very little likely escaped the country. It's all in country fraud.

Where do you think those local authorities spent their money? They knew the local housing market was no good. Even the things that did get built were Tofu-dreg projects. The bought real estate in the US and Canada.

Real estate in Canada? Just the way it's outlined makes it sound like some foreign led fraud as opposed to a mostly home grown corrupt practices.

A similar thing happens in American suburbs where they expand cities with business malls and suburban development to enlarge the tax base but ignore O&M on infrastructure then sell more development to compensate.

But in china, they were selling development with ever building them because it became an investment vehicle.

Re: China’s property giant Evergrande files for bankruptcy protection in Manhattan

#352

Post by The_Colonel »

worrycue wrote: post #179
globalise83 wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In 1980, Japan had a huge population boom in the 35-45 age range, of energetic people who had grown up during a golden age of technological and economic development. Then they were hit by a demographic timebomb... https://www.nippon.com/en/in-depth/a01001/ By 2060 Japanese children will be in the low single-digit millions, maybe 1/3 of the number when the experienced workers of the 80s were kids in the 1960s. There i…

China has the same demographic timebomb. China's peak labor was like in early 2010s I believe. Their birth rate has been declining the last few decades.

China's demographic slump is actually much more dramatic than Japan's.

Re: China’s property giant Evergrande files for bankruptcy protection in Manhattan

#353

Post by The_Colonel »

NovaDudely wrote: post #137
ricardo81 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree, it's so hard to tell nowadays and consensus of different media outlets maybe helps. FWIW on Evergrande, I always find Patrick Boyle's channel educational and insightful. He has a few videos on the topic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXCpis_Mlwk&list=PLHC72UlhAt...

China has been tipped to fail any time now for the last 25 years. They have long term issues but they will play out over long term results. A whimper rather than a boom!

US economic crash has been forecasted perennially all the way up to 2007, none of them turned out true, until...

It's difficult to predict a dramatic crash, but it's much easier to detect an economy not doing well.

Re: China’s property giant Evergrande files for bankruptcy protection in Manhattan

#354

Post by The_Colonel »

Balero wrote: post #231
dougmwne wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Money is an abstract representation of the labor of others. If there’s no one to labor for you then your currency is just paper.

I agree in theory with you. But you can 'bank' labour for later on. Building infrastructure (that will last) when you have a population bulge, means that the generations after can take advantage of that infrastructure, and have to do the lower amount of work, of maintaining it. This can go for things like education, investing in businesses, and generally any capital. Of course you can also over build this capital tha…

You can't over-build things like old age care. We still don't have robots to feed and bath old people.

Re: China’s property giant Evergrande files for bankruptcy protection in Manhattan

#355

Post by The_Colonel »

fmajid wrote: post #344
tjpnz wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing didn't cause the other but it needs to be considered when looking longterm. Its effect will have an impact on the economy for many decades.

Of course, demography is destiny, but the point is the sudden worsening of China's economic outlook did not coincide with tightening of the one-child policy, quite the opposite. The challenge for China is that it got old before it got rich like the European nations or Japan, and this transition will be much harder to navigate.

The bigger challenge is that the demigraphic shift is much more dramatic than either Europe or Japan.

The fertility rate was 6 in 1970, it dropped to a half within a decade and then kept dropping rapidly.

Re: China’s property giant Evergrande files for bankruptcy protection in Manhattan

#356

Post by geysersam »

fnordpiglet wrote: post #342
geysersam wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There’s a lot of speculation that the relatively mild inflation the US experienced post pandemic was due to all the QE and other moves the government and governmental bodies did, as well as pandemic stimulus. How would stimulus and QE help prevent inflation? Can you point to someone doing that speculation?

I didn’t say it prevented inflation, I said inflation was mild given the amount of stimulus. IMO this is because as supply of money increased demand did too, and supply was sufficient to meet demand and the economy expanded rather than price inflation.

I see, I misread you. You meant the inflation was due to the QE. I thought you meant the mildness was due to the QE.

Re: China’s property giant Evergrande files for bankruptcy protection in Manhattan

#357

Post by lossolo »

keepamovin wrote: post #348
paxys wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are sharing the official written policy, but the reality on the ground is very different in China. Most business happens under the table. Corruption and bribes are commonplace in every transaction. Books are all fudged to a high degree. Millions of people who put up large deposits and made monthly payments for under construction houses to developers like Evergrande are never getting anything back, and laws aren't…

I don't mean to burst your bubble, but... this picture of a "house of cards"-economy, with "swindles all the way down", riddled Swiss-cheese-style with corruption, while indeed a Western populist idyll visage of China these days (a sort of Western-denialists wet dream of impending Chinese doom), is inaccurate, and I think, dangerous for folks in the West to believe, if they truly hope to compete with "their biggest s…

> Sorry, but truth ain't always easy to hear.

It's copeium. The alternative is to admit that there could be another system, authoritarian, non-democratic, where there is no freedom, yet it's successful and have a chance to be the biggest economy in the world in a few decades. At this point, it's all about ideology.

Re: China’s property giant Evergrande files for bankruptcy protection in Manhattan

#358

Post by aylmao »

oblio wrote: post #150
berdario wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, prosperous. But as prosperous as the US? And being prosperous doesn't mean not being dependent. Japan agreed to the Plaza accords https://youtu.be/pU_yyadYgG8 Other Asian countries probably are going to be careful before signing up for something equivalent.

Is the US supposed to make these countries as prosperous as itself? Please do list all the prosperous Chinese or Russian allies. I'll wait.

China is putting a lot of money down with its Belt and Road initiative, and specifically has tried to attract partners/allies calling it vehicle for prosperity [2]. In Africa, they've been building infra and haven't shied away from forgiving debt [1].

This certainly plays in their interest. The USA's support for global trade and the economic prosperity of countries key in their trade network (like Japan, for example) are similar ventures. I'm not saying China is making countries as prosperous as itself, but it is certainly working to make being a Chinese ally economically attractive.

[1]: https://www.voanews.com/a/china-cancels-23-loans-to-africa-a...

[2]: https://thefinancialexpress.com.bd/views/opinions/chinas-eff...

Re: China’s property giant Evergrande files for bankruptcy protection in Manhattan

#359

Post by vkou »

brigadier132 wrote: post #327
geysersam wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Innocent in what sense? In China it's not always enough to not break a law to be innocent. You might also have to act in the spirit of the law (as interpreted by the CCP) to be sure to not become the target of the justice system. This is very different from the western system. But I think most people would agree that sometimes complete "rule of law" can also lead to perverse outcomes where very immoral business behav…

> In China it's not always enough to not break a law to be innocent. You might also have to act in the spirit of the law (as interpreted by the CCP) to be sure to not become the target of the justice system So people that are family members and friends of fugitives are not acting in the spirit of the law and deserve to be punished?

> deserve to be punished?

Deserve doesn't factor into it. The world isn't fair.

When we declare war on some country most of us can't even find on the map, some barber in it who gets a Hellfire missile in his shop's window didn't 'deserve' it, but he still receives his share of collective punishment, because the ends justify the means.

Re: China’s property giant Evergrande files for bankruptcy protection in Manhattan

#360

Post by aylmao »

modo_mario wrote: post #163
dmix wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither the Vietnam war nor Plaza Accords were about "keeping Asians down". Unintentional side effects is not intention. A very important distinction. Japan's recent Stagflation has plenty of obvious internal causes. Blaming the west for that is some weird cope. China is an expert at manipulating their currency and internal markets for global advantage. Countries reacting to China's top-down aggressive self interest…

>Japan's recent Stagflation has plenty of obvious internal causes. Blaming the west for that is some weird cope. I don't think it extends so far since it's the 80's but I can see why one would blame the US there. Around this time Japan was forced to do technology transfers to the US, to have minimum marketshare in japan for US cars and semiconductors, to have unfavorable monetary policy. That smells equivalent to bei…

I'm from Mexico. Given the landscape with energy worldwide, the current president has been overhauling the energy sector to keep foreign influence low. It makes sense in the current geopolitical climate, which really shook the energy market worldwide. I mean, France straight-up nationalized Electricite de France for example [1].

The USA is not happy about this [2]. Understandably, this affects American companies' business in the country. The USA is happy do take action in defense of its national security and its national industries, but fights back when other countries do the same.

[1]: https://www.neimagazine.com/news/newsfrench-government-wins-....

[2]: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/1/6/whats-behind-the-ene...

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