number of the day / new trading accounts in china

when i read news like this about china the song "one step beyond" from madness comes to mind. they should bring out a chinese version "10 steps beyond" remixed by "mega madness"

mir fällt beim lesen solcher news immer gleich die gruppe madness samt dem titel "one step beyond ein". zeit für ne chinesische neuauflage remixed from "mega madness"



Some 4.787 million new A-share trading accounts were opened in April, more than the combined number of the previous two years, statistics from China Securities Depository and Clearing Corporation.

China's main stock index hit a fresh all-time high after breaking a key barrier of 4,000 points due to the soaring blue chip stocks as investors shrugged off official warnings of a possible market bubble amid soaring corporate profits

The stocks in the Shanghai and Shenzhen markets are trading at more than 40 times earnings per share on average, much higher than developed markets overseas.

China - The people's republic in the grip of popular capitalism / Economist

scary stuff. if this is not a bubble......... if you want more examples how overheated the economy, investments, valuations etc are please click on the label (skip this/the first story). stunning!

wahnsinn. wenn das keine blase ist..........wer mehr belege haben möchte das einige dinge wie invenstitionen, bewertungen usw überhitzt sind den bitte ich unter den labeln zu suchen (jeweils den ersten/diesen bericht skippen). atemberaubend!


Tens of millions of Chinese are risking their shirts in a stockmarket frenzy. If it goes wrong, things could get nasty

WOULD-BE share punters, keen for a piece of China's booming stockmarket, are queuing to open accounts at a Beijing branch of China Merchants Securities. ..... Bunches of small investors, ranging from students to pensioners, crowd around computer terminals to carry out their trades, keeping an eye on the prices as they flicker across big electronic screens. China's biggest-ever stockmarket boom may be turning into a bubble—and the country's leaders are getting worried.

> why they put in question the bubble is beyond me

>wie man die blase nach diesem bericht noch in frage stellen kann entzieht sich meiner vorstellung....

thanks to michael panzer http://www.financialarmageddon.com/

If the bubble were to pop, it could have a bigger impact on social stability than any previous downturn in the stockmarket's 16-year history. There are now more than 91m accounts held by individuals at brokers or in mutual funds. Estimates for the number of investors vary widely. At the height of the last market boom, in 2001, there were 60m accounts but perhaps fewer than 10m investors. There are certainly many millions more now. New accounts at brokers are being opened at a rate of more than 200,000 a day, touching a high of more than 310,000 on April 24th. The total so far this year is more than 8m, which is around ten times as many as in the whole of 2005, when the market began to emerge from a four-year slump. ......

The Shanghai composite index for yuan and hard-currency shares is now approaching 4,000, a rise of nearly 40% so far this year after a 130% increase in 2006 (see chart).

Some economists fret that share prices are moving far ahead of companies' earnings, to a degree scarily reminiscent of Japan in the late 1980s just before its crash. With the help of new share listings, the combined market value of the Shanghai and Shenzhen exchanges has risen to some 15 trillion yuan ($1.8 trillion), 87% more than at the end of last year and surpassing that of Hong Kong.

The growing involvement of low-income groups such as students and pensioners, who were more cautious during the last bull run, could make a crash more painful. Mr Xing says 20-30% of economics and business students are playing the markets. ....

So many employees are spending their time trading stocks online that some companies have introduced fines to deter them. But many continue surreptitiously trading and sharing tips through e-mails, instant messaging and texts. Mobile-telephone users (that is, almost every adult city-dweller) can subscribe to stockmarket alerts and trade shares simply by pressing buttons on their handsets.

Another big change is the ready availability of mortgageable or pawnable assets with which to raise money to buy shares. Since the late 1990s, the privatisation of urban housing has given many people a stake in rapidly appreciating property. And with consumer-price inflation creeping up to a two-year high of 3.3% at the end of March, real interest rates have been around zero or negative this year. This has encouraged the withdrawal of savings from banks. Hou Ning, a Beijing-based analyst, says that in the countryside unlicensed moneylenders have been helping farmers into the markets with unsecured high-interest loans.

> at least they have not yet all the creative loans/instruments like in the us.......

> immerhin haben die bisher nícht die errungenschaften der kreativen finanzierung wie in den usa......

China's leaders are worried, but unsure what to do to cool the market. A string of interest-rate rises and increases in banks' reserve requirements have had little effect so far. Like their fellow communists in neighbouring Vietnam, where a similar stockmarket bubble has grown, they know that share gains keep the rising middle class contented and help the state's big privatisation programme. But if tens of millions of urban Chinese lose their shirts, they could turn their anger on the party.

Twice this year—on February 27th and April 19th—the markets have wobbled alarmingly amid rumours of tougher measures to control the flow of cash. The latest upset was caused by figures showing the economy growing even faster than expected: in the first quarter of this year, output was up 11.1% on the same period of last year. But the bulls have quickly returned. Outside the China Merchants Securities branch, a group of investors debates the market's prospects. “It's like a casino set up by the Communist Party,” says one. Another says only fools are still investing. But none has any plans to cash out

> looks like the 6th raise of the Bank Reserve Ratio in the past 10 month plus several rate hikes plus other attempts to cool things down have failed poorly. maybe they should combine a hike and the raise of the reserve ratio to gain control and respect.

>sieht ganz so aus als wenn alle versuche der chinesicshen offiziellen in den letzten monaten die lage zu beruhigen jämmerlich versagt haben. evtl. sollte sie es mal mit einem doppelschlag von zinserhöhung und der 7. erhöhung der reserveanfordeungen probieren um zumindest etwas die kontrolle zurückzuerlangen.

update: http://tinyurl.com/2eos8w

Shanghai-traded shares of China Citic Bank Corp. more than doubled on their first day of trading after a $5.4 billion stock sale, the world's biggest this year.

``People don't mind paying a bit of a premium'' if they are comfortable with the growth outlook, Binay Chandgothia, who helps manage $1.6 billion as chief investment officer at Principal Asset Management Company (Asia) Ltd., said today in Hong Kong. ``There's demand for new stocks.''

"The `Skyscraper Curse' Is Worth Watching in 2007"

an alternative indicator. but a fascinating one. it also reflects some importend topics like the carry trade, loose credit etc. (see labels at the bottom of the post). i hope that someone from the us can tell me if my projection on the chicago project is correct.

zwar ein alternativer indikator. trotzdem interessant. er streift zudem wichtige themen wie den carrytrade, wild wuchernde kreditmärkte etc.... (bitte dazu die labels am ende des posts beachten)

Dec. 11 (Bloomberg) -- ...... I'm wondering if it might make more sense to look at the skyline.

Standing out amidst the tangle of skyscrapers is the 1,671- foot (509 meters) Taipei 101, which is currently the world's tallest building. Its presence, coupled with a worsening political crisis that could trip up the economy, reminds one of the ``Skyscraper Curse.''

A bizarre suggestion, perhaps, and certainly an unscientific one. Yet history shows an uncanny correlation between tallest building projects and financial crises. Be it in Kuala Lumpur in 1997, Chicago in 1974, New York in 1930 or the biblical Tower of Babel long ago, mankind's penchant for architectural overreach is a strangely reliable omen of troubles.

A coincidence? Perhaps, yet economists such as Mark Thornton, senior fellow at the Ludwig von Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama, argue that skyscrapers can speak volumes about a nation's wealth, technological prowess, ambition and, perhaps most importantly, hubris.

Rome's Last Days
``It's these features that make skyscrapers, especially the construction of the world's tallest building, a salient marker of 20th-century business cycle,'' Thornton argues.

For a time in the early 2000s, analyst Andrew Lawrence, then with Deutsche Bank Securities in Hong Kong, published a periodic ``Skyscraper Index'' for investors. As 2007 approaches, perhaps we need to start producing more building-project barometers.

Take Dubai, which is undergoing one of history's greatest construction booms. After visiting the city recently, economist Claudia Zeisberger of the Asia Pacific Institute of Finance at Insead in Singapore quipped: ``All the building going on made me feel like I was experiencing the last days of ancient Rome.''

Perhaps it is just a coincidence, but "dubai" is putting the finishing touches on a 2,300-foot building that will top Taipei 101.

In "china"China, the 101-story Shanghai World Financial Center will become the most populous nation's tallest building. And a residential construction project in "chicago"will top the Sears Tower, currently North America's tallest skyscraper. ( i almost rule out that the chicago project will ever get startet! the dubai and shanghai building have already breaking ground./ ich schließe fast zu 100% aus das das chicago projekt jemals gestartet wird. die projekte in dubai und shanghai sind schon gestartet.)

Excess Cash
In India, developers are planning to build a 140-story skyscraper in the city of Gurgaon, near New Delhi. In 2008, South Korea will complete the 1,903-foot International Business Center, which the government hopes will solidify Seoul's place as a global business hub. Massive skyscrapers also are being considered from Australia to Russia to Brazil.

``It all makes sense given current conditions,'' Thornton says.

Even though the Federal Reserve, Bank of Japan and European Central Bank have been raising interest rates, markets are still awash in excess cash. Loose monetary policies have fueled investment frenzies in London, Shanghai, Tokyo and elsewhere. They have increased the amount of leverage in the global financial system, raising the stakes if growth slows markedly in 2007.

Over-investment and financial speculation led to each of the Skyscraper Curse episodes during the 20th century. Coincidence or not, history suggests such projects are often less about technological innovation than economic booms. The desire to have the tallest building correlates suspiciously well with sudden capital inflows that pump up credit creation and confidence.

Presaging Gloom
In 1908, for example, New York's 47-floor Singer Building opened, followed by the 50-story Metropolitan Life Building. Both were planned, financed and raised while the U.S. was in the midst of the Panic of 1907, a credit crunch that necessitated help from financier J.P. Morgan.

In 1929, the opening of 40 Wall Street and the Chrysler Building were harbingers of the worst-ever U.S. meltdown, the Great Depression. A year later, the Empire State Building became the world's tallest building, presaging years of gloom.

The 1970s saw the completion of New York's World Trade Center and Chicago's Sears Tower. They opened amid stagflation in the U.S. economy, a fiscal crisis in New York and the breakdown of the Bretton Woods monetary system.

Tall Task
More recently, Malaysia's 1,483-foot Petronas Towers were being completed during the Asian crisis. .....

Thickening the plot: the plunge in the U.S. dollar analysts have predicted for years may come in 2007. Other risks include a slowdown in China, higher global interest rates and inflation and geopolitical risks from North Korea, Iran, Iraq and a number of other regions. Oil prices also might climb anew.

Add in the rapid increase in the number of hedge funds and the proliferation of the so-called yen-carry trade. The trade, a favorite among hedge-fund managers, involves borrowing in ultra- low-interest-rate yen and re-investing the funds in riskier, higher-yielding assets elsewhere. It is believed to have greatly increased leverage in markets around the globe.

None of this means a crisis is in the cards ........