Economy/Resources - 236. page

Huanqiu reprinted an article from China Business Times stating that U.S. Wall Street companies are responsible for the real estate bubble in China. China’s real estate bubble is being driven up by speculation on Wall Street. "They use all available tools, sometimes to sing the blues, and other times to flatter the Chinese real estate market. Their sole purpose is to make a profit.” Take MSREFIII International and MSREFIV International (both Morgan Stanley funds), for example. According to the article, 50% of their funds went to China where Morgan Stanley obtained Chinese government support and approval to jointly develop real estate with Chinese partners. They soon bought out their Chinese partners and took over control of the real estate. “They have now sold out their residential and office buildings. … Their profits on paper are at least 100%,” said the article. 

Source: Huanqiu, October 15, 2010
http://finance.huanqiu.com/roll/2010-10/1172836.html

On October 23, 2010, Chinese Business View (www.hsw.cn), one of China’s official websites, published an analytical article titled, “The Truth behind the United States’ Coercive Purchase of Chinese Rare Earth Minerals.” 

The article claims that the reason that US-led Western countries are pressuring China to rescind rare earth export restrictions is to store rare earth. Once China’s rare earth supply is depleted, they will have enough rare earth to confront China.

Source: Chinese Business View, October 23, 2010
http://hsb.hsw.cn/2010-10/23/content_7912280.htm

The China State Council issued a notice stating that, beginning December 1, 2010, China will collect a city maintenance and development tax and an education fee from enterprises in China that have foreign investors, and from foreign companies, as well as from foreign individuals. This is a major move to unify the tax policies for both domestic enterprises, and enterprises with foreign investors, after having unified the income taxes on them in 2008.

Source: Xinhua, October 21, 2010
http://news.xinhuanet.com/2010-10/21/c_13568892.htm

On October 19, Xinhua reported that China has started research and development on a super high-speed train that can exceed 500 km (310 miles) per hour. China has become the largest country with such a high-speed train capability and scale. At the end of September, China had two high-speed railroads under construction. One will cover 7,055 km and another over 10,000 km. On September 28, 2010, during a test run on the Shanghai-Hangzhou high-speed railroad, “Harmony” CRH308A, China’s own high-speed train, set a world record of 416.6 km per hour.

Source: Xinhua, October 19, 2010
http://news.xinhuanet.com/2010-10/19/c_12674953.htm

The Hurun Report recently published its 2010 list of the wealthiest individuals in China. The average wealth of the top 1,000 increased 26% from last year. The most rapid increases were in the medical, IT, retail, and apparel industries. The number of billionaires reached 1,363 this year, and 97 reached the 10-billion level. Ten years ago, those numbers were 24 and 1, respectively. Also, most of the wealthiest women in the world are from China. Out of the top 20 self-made female billionaires in the world, 11 are from China.

The Hurun Institute publishes the report. It is a "leading luxury publishing and events group," comprising a magazine and an active events business targeted at China’s high net worth individuals. It was established in 1999 by Rupert Hoogewerf. The Wall Street Journal (US Edition Jan 2008) commented that “people often aren’t considered truly rich until anointed by the Hurun Report.”

Source: China News Service, October 12, 2010
http://www.chinanews.com.cn/cj/2010/10-12/2580858.shtml

The Chinese Ministry of Land and Natural Resources recently announced that, in order to further implement State Council policies, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, the Ministry of Land and Natural Resources, and the Ministry of Supervision jointly decided that the provincial level governments will be held accountable for stabilizing housing prices. An assessment system will be established and there will be a follow-up for poor performance. The three ministries are demanding a nationwide increase in housing supplies as well as an increase in the speed of development of low-income housing projects. Effective land supply management is also a requirement and is being put under the monitoring program. Stronger market supervision was also mentioned in the announcement.

Source: China Review News, October 12, 2010
http://gb.chinareviewnews.com/doc/1014/7/2/0/101472005.html?coluid=45&kindid=0&docid=101472005&mdate=1012084341

On October 11, 2010, China’s central bank, the People’s Bank of China, notified six banks that it will increase the required reserve ratio for them by 50 basis points. The six banks include the four major state-owned banks and 2 publicly traded banks, China Merchants Bank and China Minsheng Bank. “The market anticipates this action will only last for 2 months. The main purpose is to react to the high number of new loans that banks issued in September of this year.”

Governor Zhou Xiaochuan said that there hasn’t been enough evidence to show that the quantitative tools that the central bank adopts, including reserve ratio and open market operation to absorb liquidity, cannot meet the goal of controlling inflation.

Source: China Review News, October 12, 2010
http://gb.chinareviewnews.com/doc/1014/7/1/6/101471619.html?coluid=10&kindid=253&docid=101471619&mdate=1011170343

Hu Siyi, the Deputy Minister of Water Resources, recently announced that the situation regarding the lack of water in northern China is getting worse due to the double pressures of global climate change and large-scale economic development. For example, the Haihe River Basin surface water level dropped 41% during the past two to three decades. The urbanization of China is speeding up rapidly. Meanwhile, the acceleration of industrialization is resulting in a rapid increase in water usage. During the past four years, just the energy and heavy chemical industries alone consumed 10 billion cubic meters more water. Hu believes that water conservation faces unprecedented challenges.

Sources: Xinhua, October 7, 2010
http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2010-10/07/c_12633704.htm