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A "Broken China" ping.

If you want on or off the ping list send me a FReepMail.

Today's Broken China ping deals with the CCP increased hiding of Big Data in order to prevent unrest. It is having the reverse effect. Among the items being hidden are:

1. Youth Unemployment - I've talked about this before. It's bad, real bad. Things are also bed for older blue collar workers.

2. Land Sales - This is a major source of income for local, city, and provincial governments of the PRC. Land sales are down so far this year. 2022 sales were down ~50% over 2021. Just under half of the revenue received by developers from the pre-construction sales goes to the CCP in the form of taxes and land sales. Remember Real estate has roughly twice the share of GDP in the PRC than the USA.

3. Foreign Exchange Reserves - Foreign exchange reserves are assets denominated in a foreign currency that are held by a nation's central bank. These may include foreign currencies, bonds, treasury bills, and other government securities. The concern here is that a sizable percentage of the PRC's FER are being held "off book". That a portion is being hidden raises red flags and not that of the PRC.

4. Aggregate Bond Quotes - This cripples the Bond Market as buyers and sellers lack the information to make intelligent trades. This means that it is very difficult for businesses to issue new corporate debt. This will further slow the PRC economy.

5. Covid deaths - Covid hammered the PRC. I saw a report that cremations for the 1Q 2023 in Zhejaing province (immediately south of Shainghai) are UP 72.9% year-over-year. There is no way to know if this is an anomaly or not.

6. Academic database - The China National Knowledge Infrastructure, a major academic repository of the CCP, has restricted foreign subscribers from accessing it since April 4^th. This means foreigners don't have access to CCP documents, patents, statistics, and seminar materials.

7. Biographies of Senior Officials - The CCP has severely restricted biographies of senior party officials from long entries to only a few lines. The CCP did not publish the monthly press releases of meetings for November 2022, and January & May of 2023. The Former Foreign Minister, Qin Gang, was suddenly promoted in June before disappearing a month later. I have also heard of disruption amongst the leader of the PLA Rocket Forces. The Rocket Forces are the keepers of the PRC's nuclear weapons. They are screened for ability but mostly for unwavering loyalty to the CCP and the General Secretary (Xi). Their minders make the Soviet Zampolit look like kindly country parish priests. FWIW - Khrushchev was a Zampolit major at the battle of Stalingrad.

WWG1WGA

Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)

The Yuan (Chinese currency) is at its lowest value against the U.S. dollar since 2006.

The value of the Yuan is controlled by the government, as President Trump oft pointed out...but they appear to be losing control, and market forces are taking over.

Bloomberg TV said the Chinese CB is in currency markets trying to ignite a short squeeze, but with little effect so far.

I am certainly no expert on these FX matters, but a significantly weakening currency is going to add to the misery of the Chinese people, as you (LP) have been discussing.

For one thing, they import much of the corn needed to produce meat—something the populace now wants. WSJ says they use 4 x the fertilizer per acre as the U.S. and still lag far behind in crop yield. This is partly the inferior soil, and partly inferior farming practices. And they also import the fertilizer.

If one wants to trigger a revolution, the surest way is for people to become hungry.

Also, the weakening currency is causing capital flight.

Dreams of a Yuan-led basket of currencies replacing the USD appear to also be flying out the window.

5. Covid deaths-—cremations: Remember how the chicoms have told us for some decades now that only the hoypaloy, the high brows, are allowed to be buried. Everybody else gets cremated. I guess the Gobi is just not big enough to handle a couple million graves at a time? From what I can see the way to count deaths there is to count the production of the burial urns, which is easier to find that death counts. After the c-bug got really started they were saying things like urn production being up ten X normal.

Then remember the reports/claims that the smoke columns from the crematoriams could be seen from orbit. As best I can tell that’s still about true. As you note it’s doubtful any death count reporting is suspicious at best. Chinese are sentimental about their gone-befores so when visiting a house careful handling what you think might be a pitcher, jewelery box, cigar box, vase, etc.