You know, we’ve been in this business a long time. We’ve seen ups, downs, gone through the rounds and been there for the rebounds. And through it all we have remained utterly, steadfastly pro-China. We wish it well, dear readers, we truly do. But lately we’ve been hearing a lot of hooey about how we’re “bearish” or “down on China.”
We were as shocked to hear it as you no doubt are right now. Poppycock, we think you’ll agree. But as a show of good faith we’ve resolved to look back on this week with lenses so rose-tinted they’d make China Daily blush crimson.
So take, for example, all the great news this week on China’s global economic integration, why don’t you? China and Hong Kong announced they’d allow fund sales to each others’ retail investors, the IMF declared the RMB was no longer undervalued, and Deutsche Boerse revealed plans for a yuan-denominated market in Frankfurt. Oh, and the US Securities and Exchange Commission demanded that… you know what maybe just forget we mentioned that last one.
But you only had to turn your gaze to the Chinese economy itself to discover a whole host of universally positive developments: Macau casinos embarked in a bold new direction, some local governments actually agreed to pay their debts after being sued by a private firm, the yuan became the top currency for doing business with China in Asia, the NDRC announced over $300 billion in public-private partnership projects, and a prominent scientist described the country’s plans for nuclear energy buildup as “insane“… er, insanely good! Yes. Insanely good.
That’s the ticket.
But surely the stock markets demonstrated more aptly than any other sector the wonderful promise of China’s economy. Why, would state media hint at stock index options if regulators weren’t confident in the market? Would FTSE announce the launch of two emerging-markets indices for China stocks if they didn’t expect them to continue ascending? Would the Shanghai Composite Index have dropped 6.5% in one day if future growth wasn’t a rock-solid lock? We… we did it again just now, didn’t we?
Well, we tried, dear readers. Slaves to the facts as we are there’s no denying things have gotten a little hairy here. But that doesn’t mean we’re down on China, of course! ♦