Tony_onrock

Nanning is going crazy. Just look at the numbers for land auction!

Well, it is finally gone, as a lot of other things. I guess the next one to be shut down will be Tianya. Did a simple search on Google today for the word "Freedom" , it did not get redirected to Hong Kong. The search was blocked. Did the same search on Baidu, a lot of dictionary definitions came up, but no other contents.

oh, I thought we were talking about a different topic.

Is there a place to download or purchase this film?

The move to Vietnam and Thailand already started two years ago. What we need here in China is a free labor union, like those in the US, controlled by the mafia or the communists (commies without Chinese characteristic). That would really help in moving the manufactoring out fast.

Not sure. There are too many things happening these days and what it takes is an economic down turn to spark it. There is a lot of hatred towards the government but no one is willing to risk it to start a revolution.

Democracy in rural areas, what a smart comment. They know that most of the people in rural areas are intellectually incapable of expressing their thoughts or make any informed decisions. Thus it is safe to talk about it.

stupid politicians are the same every where. actually, they are not supid, they are simply freaking liars. here is what it means: higer taxes for the rich, tax break for the poor and a property tax to ensure that the poor will soon find themselves too poor even to rent, let alone, buy an apartment. The poor will also soon find out that raising the tax exemption amount from 1500 RMB per month to 5000 per month (or even 3000 per month) makes no difference to them and the rich would find out that you can raise the taxes like in the USA but it would have nothing to do with them. The rich don't pay no taxes like the poor! The middle class would find that the will have to bear the taxes that is needed for the, well, I don't know. Sounds familiar?

Question is: how much what he says represent the government and what it means in practice. I personally believe Wen, deep down in his heart is pro-demoracy. Then what he can do against such a large interest group, is doubtful

P.S. ever looked at why some shopping malls are more sucessful than others? Acceptance of gift cards! The octopus in Hong Kong is the perfect solution, I believe for China. If a government employee can buy basically everything with a gift card for their daily expenses, other than housing, they don't need to take any bribes!

Well, I was surprised at one official in Shanghai, the former deputy district head. He did not take much bribes. This guy fell in love with a business woman, tried to get a divorce but failed. On his last trip to Paris he refused to come back with the others. The government went into a thorough investigation to see if the reason behind it was corruption. To their surprise, they did not find any evidence that he took bribes. What they found was this woman. She was rich. They agreed to elope to France and after he refused to come back, she changed her mind. She was scared that they may have a hard time living in France, with language and other problems. He came back after the party secretary personally called him and assured him there is no problem with his return. Now he is back, happily divorced and happily married again to that woman. Only difference, he no longer is a government official. What does it show? At least there is one government official in China that does not take bribes. Please, please, show me one more and I will have a lot more confidence in the future of the Chinese government.

You should know better than that. No government employee legally earns 200k per year. Cabinet level officials (i.e. ministers) have a net salary of about 6 - 7k. When you say state-owned bank it can be confusing because in one way or another the government owns every bank in China with the exception of those like HSBC, perhaps. If you mean employees of the traditional Big Four, there is no way anybody except for, perhaps, the very senior management to legally earn 200k per year. It would be a miracle if a branch manager or even an area branch manager took home 7k per month. The typical bonus for any of these people is a 13th month salary. I can echo Bill's point as the government workers in China are low-paid when compared with those who work in the private sector. They often receive a few other benefits though like housing and a lifetime pension. You forgot to mention graft. They do have a great pension program. Although free housing was supposed to be eliminated, they do get a thousand or two as a housing allowance (included in salary figures, above). The real benefit comes when they are sold properties at far below market value. A rather large group of individuals at one particular state-owned bank has been offered 70 m2 units inside the 3rd Ring at 2,500 RMB per m2. This is not uncommon. Bill, what is exactly the legally earned amount? Every year the government officcials, from fire to sanitation to neighborhood committee groups, to ¡£¡£¡£come over for a gift, typically a transit card or something. The amount is not big, say a few hundered RMB or for guys in charge a few thousands. How many businesses operate in that particular district? We had an operation and did not provide the gift cards in one particular district (police). We got a letter to shut down. I have a friend who invested 300,000 Rmb for a postion in government (he was switched from a chu zhang in light industrial to safty inspection) and recovered his investment within four month. I got into a fight with him when he threatened to shut down the junior high that I went to for safty reasons (failer to pay). Why do you think Chinese mines have some many accidents? He told me that if he try to enforce the safty regulations, he would lose his job. The mine owner pay directly to Beijing! Give me an example of any government employee that do not receive gift cards or some other benefits. Look at the number of people who apply for the exam to become public servants and one would understand why. Foreign funds like us are hard to compete. How much do bank employees really earn? Not that much, if you check the published stats. A typical loan, in harder time, require a payment of brokerage fee ranging from 0.8 to as high as 3% points. The broker, of course is not a bank employee but has good relationship with the one approving or disapproving the loan. The commission is shared with the bank employee£¬ who in turn, to avoid being thrown into jail, shares with the remainder of the bank employees, his boss and others in the office. It is an open secret. The only reason the head of the insurance guy who just been sentenced to 17 years got caught is because he did not learn a good lesson in sharing. Even with that, he was charged with mis-use of funds and taking a bribe of 2 mm RMB. The 9 mm RMB commission he received was not treated as a bribe. All these were in the Government newspaper. If you do DD in M&A on targets, you will understand how much off balance sheet payments are made by local companies.

just came back from a trip to Chengdu. Funny scene on TV, with employers holding out cardboard cards stating the number of people, salary, work etc required at this job fair. Some played nasty and went direct to the train station to get a head start before the others. It was like a meat market.

Stone: I get asked the same questions by some of our investors as well. How can they afford to pay for these apartments given the income level? How do they qualify for the bank loan? Here is how they do it: After they decide to buy and agreed on a price, etc. a young couple would first come up with the down payment. The guy asks his mom and dad, the girl ask her mom and dad (other than in Shanghai, typically) to pool together the down payment, at least the bulk of it and they themselves put some money in too. Then they go to the personnel department and ask for a income verification letter to be chopped. They take this letter, the draft of which is typically prepared by the agent or at least a draft reviewed by the agent, to the bank and get a loan. How the hell they pay the monthly mortgage is another matter. It is typically a struggle. We don't have development projects in Beijing. So I don't have a breakdown of investment purchase versus self use. Nor did I have numbers on the average income. There were rumors at one point in time that we were going to trata title sell one of our properties, between 2nd and 3rd ring at 38,000 /sm with GFA ranging from 180 to 300 sm. I got a call from my cousin asking to reserve one for her and calls from the lending bank to reserve one for them. I know my cousin's income, but not how much these state owned bank employees make. I guess their salary would be around 200K per year with a year end bonus (cash and gift cards, etc of a little over a million RMB). In Beijing there are more than a few douzen (thousands?) government employees/public servants and they would treat it as a real insult if you ask them if they make more than 200k RMB a year. The factory workers and the office front desk ladies don't buy.

A-b, b-c, c-d, d-0, b-a, c-b, d-c, a-0, That is the equation. Class D men and Class A women end up being single. The problems lies in culture. Chinese men wants to be in charge and Chinese women always wants some one stronger than themselves, economically and education wise. Women tend to do better in terms of education in China, however. Not sure about women in the states, the ones I spoke to here keep on saying:" If I don't admire him (meaning he is much more sucessful in all respects), how can I love him?". Solution: second wives for Class A men and cheaper imports for class D men.

missed this post. I flew to Nanning on the 12th from Shanghai also. enjoyed the cold in Nanning, roller bladed two laps around the South Lake each day (17.2 Km) for a week. Next time I can host a party on my deck in nanning once the fit out is complete. Bought a house there with 80 sq meter roof deck close to the river. To avoid the bad hotels, stay at a good hotel. Next time in Beijing, let me know I can book you Hotel G at owner's rate. Only draw back, no flirting with the front desk girls. Our affiliate owns two resorts in Thailand and the largest hotel chain there also.

The down payment ranges from 20% to 50%. Small units (90 sm and below), others 30%, second apartment 40% and villas usu. 50%. Income verification is, well, pretty much determined by access to your company's chop. The low rental yield is due to the high housing prices, which was pushed up by actual and expected appreciation of the property value. Commercial property, retail, office and hotels are a bit different, but each a different animal. Office rental is quite straight forward but the yield is still low compared to developed countries. Retail, whether shopping mall or department store, are all run in a department store manner, more or less, with turn over rent playing a large part. Hotel really depends on occupancy and operation. It is labor intensive, takes 9-12 months to reach break even. Personally I like serviced apartment better, esp. where there is ability to do daily rental. there is a real bubble in some cities (San Ya for sure will crash soon). when it pops it will drag down some of the second and third tier cities but it will soon rebound. With land price at a few hundred bucks RMB, one can afford to wait.

It can be real comedy here sometimes as to where people are getting their figures when they make statements. I would consider it very likely that many Chinese young, and real estate investors are opting to go the mortgage route, in lieu of years past where predominately cash was paid in full. It would be very difficult to validate any figures, as I don't know that they are published in China. That culture of remaining debt free is alive and well. There are dangers in financing a home in China. Many of my co-workers have opted to get a loan, and had to come up with the standard 50% of the total value when submitting the application to the bank. The danger here is, that if you don't get approved, and it does happen, that you lose that 50% down fee. Therefore, unless you have a very stable income and history, it is still safer to pay the total in cash. Also, don't forget that most Chinese live in rural areas where everything is different. well, I have to admit that I did not look at the overall figures published by any research group. I base the 80% mortgage number on our own experience. We have 2 residential developments in Guangzhou that are selling, one development in Chengdu that is selling, two huge develoment projects in 2nd and third tier cities in Jiangsu selling and one not yet reached pre-sale stage. If you add the total it is over 4 million sq. meters of development and actually have sold over thousands of apartments. We watch the cash flow daily. In our projects, about 80% get mortgages on average. We get a weekly report of how many units sold and how much cash came back, including a break down of cash purchase and bank loan draw down.

T Most Chinese people don't get mortgages. They pay cash for the complete price of their home. This includes young and old alike. This is actually not true. 80% get mortgages and only about 20% pay cash. The claim that young people are finding it hard to have roof over their head is also not true. Although housing prices have gone up quite a bit, rental has not. The rental return is about 3-4% in most cities and as low as 2% in cities with high housing prices. People can rent.

MORGAN STANLEY RESEARCH CHINA ECONOMICS: DEJA VU: DISSECTING HEIGHTENED UNCERTAINTY - February 08, 2010 GMT (6 pgs/ 63 kb) Qing Wang +852 2848 5220 Morgan Stanley Asia Limited Steven Zhang +86 21 2326 0029 Deja vu: There has been tremendous uncertainty about economic and policy outlook of late. At such times we tend to look to recent history for guidance. Is this going to be like 2003-04 where the authorities responded to an overheating economy with campaign-style macro-controls in Apr 04 that lasted about 6 months, and both the economy and stock market demonstrated remarkable resilience? Or is this going to be like 2006-2007 when aggressive credit controls were imposed in Oct 07-especially vis-a-vis the property sector-lasting for about 9 months and contributed to-albeit not directly causing-a hard landing of the economy upon the onset of the Great Recession. Dissecting heightened uncertainty: First, a repeat of 2003-04 is possible IF external demand were to turn out to be extraordinarily strong ('the Summer: Overheating' scenario under our four-season framework). Second, a repeat of 2007-08 is possible IF Chinese authorities were to fail to learn the lesson from their management of the property sector in 2008 and go down the same policy route in 2010 and the major industrial economies were to suffer a 'double-dip' in growth ("the Winter: Policy-induced Double Dip' scenario). Last but not the least, entering 2010 the Chinese economy is facing a weak (instead of strong, as in 2003-04) but improving (instead of deteriorating, as in 2007-08) external environment. This, together with less political-cycle influence, will make Chinese authorities more likely to get macro policy right this time, in our view. Conclusions: ''The Autumn: Goldilocks' under our four-season framework remains our base case scenario. While the heightened uncertainty of late has already taken its toll on the stock market, the rather violent market reaction since the beginning of the year is unwarranted, in our view. We endorse the investment theses recently put forward by our equity strategy team. Introduction: Deja vu There has been tremendous uncertainty about economic and policy outlook of late. In such times we tend to look to recent history for guidance. Is this going to be like 2003-04 where the authorities responded to an overheating economy with campaign-style macro-controls in Apr 04 that lasted about 6 months and both the economy and stock market demonstrated remarkable resilience? Or is this going to be like 2006-2007 where aggressive credit controls were imposed in Oct 07¡ªespecially vis-a-vis the property sector¡ªlasting about 9 months and contributed to¡ªalbeit not directly causing¡ªa hard landing of the economy. It may be like ¡®2003-04¡¯ IF¡­ The situation in the run up to tightening that began in April 2004 was quite different from the current one, making the tightening back then completely justified. The average YoY growth rates of key variables during the six months leading to the onset of tightening in April 2004 clearly pointed to an overheating economy: FAI 37%, Exports 37%, IP 18%, Loan 27%, and CPI 2.7% (Exhibit 1). The aggressive tightening launched in April 2004 featured strict investment project approval, tight controls over bank lending, and a moratorium on developing agricultural land for industrial/commercial use, as well as a RRR hike. There was only one interest rate hike six months after the tightening began, as the headline CPI inflation peaked and stared to moderate while PPI was about to peak (Exhibit 6 and 7). Despite the aggressive tightening, the economy demonstrated remarkable resilience: while FAI growth decelerated sharply from the pre-tightening levels of 40-50%YoY to about 20%YoY in the months immediately after the launch of tightening before stabilizing around 25%YoY thereafter (Exhibit 3). In the meanwhile, IP growth only registered a modest slowdown, helped by extraordinarily strong export growth throughout the entire tightening cycle (Exhibit 2 and 4). Obviously, the current cyclical conditions of the economy are far too weak to justify an aggressive tightening of the same magnitude that launched in April 2004. Moreover, it should be highlighted that the overheating in 2003-04 reflected remarkable strength in both domestic (i.e., FAI) and external (i.e., exports) demand. The only explanation for the current round of tightening¡ª although we prefer calling it ¡®policy normalization¡¯¡ªwith its beginning dated January 2010 appears to be early policy action to preempt an economic overheating like the one in 2003-04. Further policy action in this regard will likely be measured, hinging on the pace of improvement on the external demand front, in our view. In this context, a repeat of 2003-04 is possible IF external demand were to turn out to be much stronger than expected (¡®the Summer: Overheating¡¯ scenario under our four-season framework materializing). This may therefore trigger aggressive policy tightening, in which case some components of the economy (e.g., FAI) may slow substantially in the short run, but the overall economy will likely be able to weather the policy shift reasonably well beyond the near term. It may be like ¡®2006-07¡¯ IF¡­ An increasing number of market observers have started to wonder whether China may repeat the aftermath of the tightening that started in October 2007. In fact, the situation in late 2007 was also quite different from the current one. Although the economy in late 2007 appeared less overheated compared to early 2004, the activity was no doubt very strong and, in particular, inflation was stubbornly high, with the average YoY growth rates of key variables being: FAI 27%, Exports 27%, IP18%, Loan 17%, and CPI 4.9% (Exhibit 1). The tightening launched in October 2007 mainly featured very tight controls over bank credit, especially vis-a-vis the property sector, such that a number of property developers were cut off their access to bank lending. As a result, investment growth declined after the tightening was launched, although the slowdown was not as sharp as in 2004. Industrial production growth also moderated accordingly. Against this backdrop of a policy-induced weakening in domestic economy, especially the property sector, the onset of the Great Recession in September 2008 brought about a collapse in China¡¯s exports, a hard landing of the economy and attendant deflation. Could we see a repeat of 2007-2008 tightening experience this time? It is possible IF: first, Chinese authorities were to fail to learn the lesson from their management of the property sector in 2008 and go down the same policy route in 2010 such that both property sales and property construction activity would slow sharply; and second, if the major industrial economies were to suffer a ¡®double-dip¡¯ in growth. (This would be ¡°the Winter: Policy-induced Double Dip¡¯ scenario under our four-season framework.) We, however, have reason to believe neither condition is likely to be met. First, the recent policy initiatives targeting at the property sector are mainly to discourage speculation and, at the same time, encourage supply, with the objective of preventing a too rapid rise in property prices. While similar policy measures were implemented back in 2007-2008, they were not the main causes for a major slowdown in property sector, in our view. The sharp slowdown in property sector in 2008 was mainly due to a ¡®buyer strike¡¯ based on expectations of a broad-based property price decline. Since property developers were cut off from their access to bank lending, it was widely expected that the credit crunch would force developers to cut property sale prices in order to promote sales and thus cash flows. Chinese authorities appear to have no intention to intervene in such a heavy-handed way this time. Second, while the recent fiscal crisis in some European countries may have cast some dark clouds over prospects for global economic recovery, this is consistent with a tepid recovery in G3 economies in 2010 as envisaged by Morgan Stanley global economics team. Our team attaches a low probability to a double-dip in growth. The authorities more likely get it right this time Given the memories of previous tightening cycles (i.e., April 2004, October 2007), there are rising concerns that the earlier-than-expected policy shift in China might suggest the onset of another round of aggressive tightening. However, as we have discussed, the current cyclical conditions of the economy are much weaker than the initial conditions that have led to the previous two rounds of aggressive tightening and thus do not justify similar policy action, in our view. With the benefit of hindsight, the tightening launched in April 2004 was more appropriate than that launched in October 2007. Both previous rounds of tightening provide useful guidance to help understand the possible future course of policy action, in our view. First, getting external demand right is key. The political campaign tightening in April 2004 did not do much damage to the real economy, because extraordinarily strong external demand helped cushion the impact of blunt policy measures. On the contrary, the tightening launched in October 2007 turned out to be ill-timed even though it was less heavy-handed than the 2004 tightening, because the external environment deteriorated drastically. Second, early and moderate tightening should always be preferred to late and drastic tightening. Both April 2004 and October 2007 tightening should have been implemented earlier, in our view. Specifically, the Chinese economy already showed signs of overheating in 2Q03 after the change of government took place. However, the policy tightening planned for 2H03 was delayed by the breakout of SARS such that aggressive tightening was not carried out until early 2Q04, when SARS was finally brought under control. The timing of the late 2007 tightening was also influenced by China¡¯s political cycle. While the economy had already shown clear evidence of overheating in the run up to change of senior leadership in October 2007, tightening policy was not implemented until immediately after the completion of election/re-election of senior headship that takes place every five years. Third, in the wake of the Great Recession, the Chinese authorities¡¯ awareness of the uncertainty over external demand could not be higher. This makes any important policy shift likely be measured and hinge on the pace of improvement in external demand. At the same time, since it is still the beginning of the third year of the current government¡¯s five year term, there is no obvious political consideration in this regard that is likely to delay any necessary policy adjustment unduly. These two factors, as well as the lessons from the previous two rounds of tightening, make us believe that recent policy action taken by the Chinese authorities should be viewed as precautionary measures to prevent a full-blown overheating and a typical boom-bust cycle. The Chinese authorities are more likely to get it right this time, in our view. Implications ¡®The Autumn: Goldilocks¡¯ under our four-season framework remains our base case scenario, although recent better-than-expected developments on the external demand front point to somewhat higher probability of the Summer scenario (see ¡°China Economics: Upgrade 2010 Forecasts on Improved External Outlook, ¡° Feb 3, 2010). While the heightened uncertainty of late has already taken its toll on the stock market, the rather violent market reaction since beginning of the year is unwarranted from the perspective of economic fundamentals, in our view. We endorse the investment theses recently put forward by our equity strategy team (see Jonathan Garner: Quantifying the Inflation Risk in APxJ ¨CMarket Impact & Winners / Losers; and Jerry Lou: Our inflation Play Book, February 3, 2010).

http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMTQ4NTEwMjI0.html For all those who can understand Chinese. This is a really cool movie, created by internet users, a fight against internet sensorship and "Green Dam"

It is kind of funny that what they charge for membership does not seem to make sense. A personal or family wealth of 2 mm RMB? Every one with an apartment in Shanghai would qualify.

well for companies that make autos, it it important news. Just 2.5 years ago, I liked my Honda CRV. Now I hate it. From a few on the road in Shanghai to every few other cars a CRV! Now I need to search for another cheap and yet enjoyable car. P.S. if you want to buy a CRV in Shangahi, you need to pay above the MFRP!

I wonder what is the most efficient green energy that can be used by individuals. I bought a house for my in-laws in Nanning. One concern is the on going engergy cost. Heating and hot water in the winter can be a lot of money for them (and the envirnment). Cooling should be of a lesser concern as it is by the river and has very good ventilation. Any suggestions? Been thinking about solar and not sure how much it would cost me. It is a three-story house (300+ Sm). There is a 60 sq. m balcony that can be enclosed and turned into a greenroom (orchid and tropical garden). Wonder if that helps with the heating partially.

actually it would be cheaper to send ground force in and secure the coast lines. Once they are cut off from the sea, they can't do it any more.