Authored by Andrew Moran via Liberty Nation, We typically imagine the Chinese entrepreneur crunching numbers, working around the clock to boost the economy, and repeating Communist propaganda about the West being the supreme devil. But we might have it wrong.
Considering that the major source of funding for tens of thousands of
companies in China originates from the central bank’s printing press,
the reality could be businessmen and employees getting plastered on baijiuand beating each other to death with Pokémon cards during office hours. Think of it as the Eastern version of The Wolf of Wall Street.
私達の多くは中国企業家が素晴らしい数字を出していると想像している、昼夜ぶっ通しで経済を推進していると、そして西欧は悪魔のようだと共産党宣伝が繰り返される。しかしこれは間違っているかもしれない。中国の何万という企業の資金源が中央銀行の紙幣印刷によるものであり、ビジネスマンも労働者も白酒を浴びて昼間からポケモンカードに興じているかもしれない。東洋版 The Wolf of Wall Streetを想像するが良い。(訳注:この映画見ました?時々BSで放送してます、株式に興味にある人にとってはなかなか面白い)
The Three Rs 3つのR
The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) recently announced that it would
inject $126.35 billion into the financial system by cutting the reserve
requirement ratio – the number of reserves that financial institutions
are mandated to hold. This represents the seventh reduction to the RRR in the last 18 months, totaling $510 billion in net liquidity.
According to the central bank, the RRR will be lowered by 50 basis
points for all commercial banks, effective September 16. Smaller
institutions will be given one additional percentage point. The RRR for
larger organizations will be dropped to 13%. PBOC officials are
attempting to spur lending, economic activity, and financial support as
the world’s second-largest economy continues to slump amid its trade war
with the US.
In a statement, the bank assured markets that it will
maintain a conservative monetary policy and will not flood the economy
with stimulus. However, officials did say that they will
increase counter-cyclical adjustments and extend immense volumes of
liquidity when necessary.
Even prior to the trade war,
the Chinese government had employed a series of measures to reverse the
slump. Thanks to the dispute with the Americans, Beijing’s growth
prospects are bearish, projected to fall to a 30-year low of 6.2% in the
second quarter of 2019. Because of this, analysts anticipate the PBOC
will impose another 50-basis-point RRR decrease. In addition, observers
prognosticate that the central bank could cut at least one of its key
policy interest rates later this month. This would be the first time
since 2015.
The routine intervention and stimulus have ostensibly
metastasized the economy into an addict, reliant on its next fix. So,
can the Chinese economy survive without the state? 介入と刺激策が定常化し、経済が中毒状態になっている、つねに次の救済に期待するのだ。というわけで中国経済は政府抜きで生き残れるのだろうか?
Every Yuan Needs Debt
人民元発行には債務の裏付けが必要
In the last five years, China’s M2 money supply – a
measurement of the money supply that includes cash, checking deposits,
and liquid assets – has ballooned 120%. Since the country is
being paralyzed by the trade spat and other negative trends that
threaten its foundation, China is not showing any signs that it is ready
to hit the pause button on money-printing. In fact, judging by previous
remarks by PBOC heads, Beijing might rev it up even more, especially if
the downturn intensifies.
But can China print to infinity? It may have to
because seemingly every area of the economy counts on being propped up
by the Communists through cash injections, stimulus projects, and
bailouts.
This past summer, several interesting reports shone a negative light on the Asian juggernaut. この夏にも、このアジアの大国に負の光をさす幾つかの報告がある。
Fitch Ratings warned that Chinese banks might not have enough capital
to lend out in the event of a steep slowdown. Analysts noted that
banks’ earnings have only been enough to sustain mandated capital
levels. It then makes sense as to why the PBOC is approving many RRR
cuts: Beijing is depending on the quasi-private sector to resuscitate
the economy through lending.
When it was discovered that the nation’s smaller banking
outfits were running into trouble, China absorbed a handful of these
entities and merged many of these weaker banks. But the problem
may be much worse than the local media and the government are letting
on. Nearly two dozen major organizations have not published up-to-date
financial reports, causing consternation in the finance industry – at
home and abroad.
There are nearly 200,000 state-owned enterprises (SOEs) within China,
all receiving some sort of support from the government. Many cheered
when it was reported that these government-sponsored businesses posted
record profits, despite the trade war and economic hiccups. But they
should hold the applause because this process is comparable to passing
money from your left hand and giving it to your right and
declaring you’re rich.
President Xi Jinping has promised that China is seeking free-market
reforms and will open its economy to the rest of the world. But many
skeptics say that it would be impossible for several reasons: There
are too many SOEs, there has been too much debt incurred, and a
significant portion of the money printed and given to state-run banks
are earmarked to keep these indebted SOEs open – they are in a coma and
running on life support. 習近平は中国は自由市場を求めていると約束し、そして経済を他国に開放すると言う。しかし多くの人はその言葉を疑っている、幾つかの理由でそれは不可能なことだからだ:あまりに多くの国有企業があり、あまりに多くの債務を抱えている、そして紙幣印刷の殆どが国有銀行に渡されこれらの債務過多国有企業を生き延びることを保証しているーーそれらの企業は生命維持装置のもとで昏睡状態で生きているに過ぎない。
Consider this February 2019 Bloomberg report:
2019年2月のブルームバーグの報告を考えてみると良い:
“In 2018, private enterprises missed payments on more than 7 percent
of bonds issued, HSBC estimates. As early as 2015, even state-owned
companies counted themselves among the list of defaulters. And yet not a
single local government-affiliated issuer has defaulted, ever.”
Liberty Nation recently reported a
new study that found if borrowing were eliminated most of the developed
economies in the world would see a negative gross domestic product
(GDP) per capita. The analysis concluded that China would be one of the
few states to see a gain in a borrowing-free universe, mainly because of
its immense currency and gold reserves. But if the market is running
mostly on debt, then wouldn’t the economy be wiped out, too?
Liberty Ntionが最近報告したが、最新の研究によると、世界の発展国からの借金を除外するとすでに一人あたりGDP成長はマイナスになっている。この分析の結論は、中国は借金やり放題で恩恵を受ける、ありえない国の一つだ、その原因は多額の外貨とゴールド備蓄による。しかしもし市場が債務で成り立っているなら、経済は壊滅することはないのだろうか?
This could explain why China has been on a gold-buying spree in
the last few years, acquiring billions of dollars worth of the yellow
metal as a hedge against volatility and perhaps its own inevitable
demise. だからこそ中国はここ数年熱狂的にゴールドを買い集めている、今後の経済変動と回避不可能な命運に対するヘッジとして巨額のゴールドを買い集めているのだ。
The Long Con
長きにわたるペテン
Guo Wengui, an exiled Chinese billionaire who is the Asian version of
Peter Schiff and considered a man of mystery by the Western press, sat
down with US hedge fund manager Kyle Bass. Wengui explained that the
Chinese economy is fake and that the Communists cheated the world,
citing a litany of data and problems to support his claims.
Put simply, the Chinese economy is one giant Ponzi scheme that depends on new investors to cover the bad debt, mask its weakness, and con the rest of the world.
The revenues derived from the Ponzi are used to launder money for the
nation’s leaders and well-connected elite. This is what modern-day
communism looks like; forget the proletariat, Karl Marx, and
Stalin-esque facial hair. It is about utilizing the power of the state,
with a modicum of the enterprise system, to generate enormous wealth.
Yet, no matter how interconnected everything is, the rules of basic
economics and finance will always intervene to blow down the house. Are
we witnessing the fall of the international finance order? It was only a
matter of time before the fiat hegemonic experiment blew up in
everyone’s face.
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