Panic grips the financial world as reports of China’s bad lending data vanish from social media platforms, underscoring the growing difficulty in accessing reliable information about the world’s second-largest economy. The sudden disappearance of research reports from mainland brokerages and securities firms has sent shockwaves through the market, leaving investors scrambling for insight into China’s economic health.
But it’s not just China causing alarm bells to ring—economic doomers worldwide are sounding the alarm, with membership on the r/economiccollapse subreddit skyrocketing by 80% in just two years. Daniel, a Reddit user from Washington, DC, echoes the sentiment, warning of an impending economic implosion akin to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
As anxiety mounts, interest in ultra-bearish market predictions surges, with Google searches for “stock market crash” and “economic crash” spiking significantly. The sentiment of impending collapse is further fueled by reports of China’s state banks selling loss-absorbing capacity bonds, raising questions about the stability of the global banking system.
Sources:
finance.yahoo.com/news/reports-china-bad-lending-data-065818245.html
Bloomberg: "China has increasingly hidden negative data over the past few years, making it harder for investors to judge what is happening in the economy."
I worry less about investors not getting data than about policymakers not getting data.t.co/qh7Lbh4eUy
— Michael Pettis (@michaelxpettis) May 14, 2024
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Bloomberg: "Two of China’s biggest state banks will sell a combined 60 billion yuan of total loss-absorbing capacity bonds starting this week, the first such debt sales by Chinese lenders in a drive to replenish capital and support growth."t.co/nBtIMwTFou— Michael Pettis (@michaelxpettis) May 14, 2024