China

Submitted by Charles Hugh Smith from Of Two Minds

Japan Desperately Needs A Stronger Dollar, China Desperately Wants A Weaker Dollar: The Fed Can't Please Both

The FX market is about to blow up in the Fed's face, and there's nothing they can do about it.

Foreign exchange (FX) is a zero-sum game: if one currency weakens, another must strengthen. Since the value of a currency is relative to other currencies, all currencies can't weaken together: at least one currency must strengthen as others weaken.

China has finally come full circle. Recall that last year as equities surged, Chinese "investors" opened enough brokerage accounts for every man, woman, and child in LA. The slowing of the economy and pending devaluation of the currency led the smart money to short the market, putting significant downward pressure on stocks. The answer to all of this was to of course arrest anyone who was involved in short selling stocks.

It was just a few days ago when we covered most recently that China has created a subprime debt bubble of monstrous proportions. We explained that the exposure isn’t just within the conventional, state-backed banking system, but also within their "wild west" shadow banking system, which has introduced "investors" to a significant amount of risk. 

We know that it’s not a question of if, but when will the bubble finally pop (and as we show below, it already has) and introduce a new subprime (and debt in general) financial crisis for the world to deal with.

The tensions between China and the world continued to escalate this week when China began operation the of a lighthouse on its recently-built island in the South China Sea. The man-made islands have caused tensions between China and the US and her allies to grow increasingly in the past few months. According to Asia Times: China claims most of the energy-rich waters of the South China Sea, through which about $5 trillion in ship-borne trade passes every year. But neighbors Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam also have claims.

Residential real estate is a slippery slope for China (especially when this frequently recurring bubble is in its bursting phase) . A critical problem the country is dealing with right now is the fact that it is now confronted with the realization that blind construction spending, building out ghost cities year in and year out, has resulted in a glut of vacant housing. There are two main issues China faces with an oversupply of vacant housing. First, it means that new construction has been slow, ultimately putting downward pressure on GDP.