Week in FX Asia – China’s WMP Count Down

Their problems are mounting and becoming more visible – from China’s perspective that’s a big deal. Data this week shows that private debt/GDP ratio has managed to soar by +50 percentage points in just four-years. This pace has markedly outstripped other Emerging economies. In fact, it’s bigger than the US and Euro region combined in the six-years prior to start of sub-prime debt problems. From an economic perspective a rapid rise in a country’s private debt/GDP ratio tends to be followed by economic weakness and balance sheet vulnerabilities among their banks. It’s no wonder that the antipodean currencies have lost -10% in the past month. China is their largest trading partner!

The current market focus is on China’s wealth management products. Observers are wondering if we are about to hear echoes of a Lehmann collapse. Back then, the market lost confidence in sub-prime mortgages being used as collateral. Why only keep that stateside? There’s supposedly CNY1.5t of these WMP’s maturing by the end of the month. The market concerns of China’s money markets being shut is that financial institution will have issues in repaying them. Any payment problems will only lead to a loss of faith and investors shying away from products and the WMP matrix will collapse. The PBoC could provide liquidity – however their intention is to punish financial institutions with shoddy lending practices. There is a fine line, when you lose market confidence everything will spiral out of control. The scale could be multiples of the bad that has already transpired this week.

WEEK AHEAD

* GBP Inflation Report Hearings
* USD Gross Domestic Product Annualized
* EUR Unemployment Change
* EUR Unemployment Rate s.a.
* GBP Gross Domestic Product
* GBP Gross Domestic Product
* JPY National Consumer Price Index
* JPY National CPI Ex Food, Energy
* EUR Consumer Price Index
* EUR Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices

This article is for general information purposes only. It is not investment advice or a solution to buy or sell securities. Opinions are the authors; not necessarily that of OANDA Corporation or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, officers or directors. Leveraged trading is high risk and not suitable for all. You could lose all of your deposited funds.

Dean Popplewell

Dean Popplewell

Vice-President of Market Analysis at MarketPulse
Dean Popplewell has nearly two decades of experience trading currencies and fixed income instruments. He has a deep understanding of market fundamentals and the impact of global events on capital markets. He is respected among professional traders for his skilled analysis and career history as global head of trading for firms such as Scotia Capital and BMO Nesbitt Burns. Since joining OANDA in 2006, Dean has played an instrumental role in driving awareness of the forex market as an emerging asset class for retail investors, as well as providing expert counsel to a number of internal teams on how to best serve clients and industry stakeholders.
Dean Popplewell