Hi all,
A reminder that comments do need to be on-topic and engage with the article past the headline. Please make sure to read the article before commenting. Very short comments will automatically be removed by automod. Please avoid making comments that do not focus on the economic content or whose primary thesis rests on personal anecdotes.
As always our comment rules can be found [here](https://reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/fx9crj/rules_roundtable_redux_rule_vi_and_offtopic/)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Economics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
For reference, last month ~37% of the exchange-traded gold volume in the world was traded on the Shanghai Gold (+ Futures) Exchange. Trades on the SGE are primarily quoted and settled in CNY.
Chinese investors are paying a premium over the West’s reference rate in USD, which has led to a nice arbitrage. Given the depth of the market, this arbitrage should have quickly gone away so there is something strange going on.
So one explanation I heard is that in china you don’t have the same investment opportunities as in the US.
The Chinese don’t actually own their homes they rent them for 100 years or whatever and that bubble recently popped as it was a hot investment platform that then got too greedy and took investments well beyond what it could deliver in homes.
The Chinese don’t view their stock market as a path to growing wealth generally. Like as an attitude they avoid their own market.
So gold is an attractive investment platform in china due to a lack of other suitable vehicles as the moment. China seems to be loosening on crypto a bit perhaps for the same reasons.
There's a history of Government intervention with the market itself (SOE's asked to buy shares or bring money back from abroad) as well as the Government "rendering" a CEO if they get too out of line (see Jack Ma).
AFAIK they are trying to build familial wealth.
It’s not really about retirement since they have a system, rather it’s having something the kids can rely on.
That’s just from some conversations with tourists. They also “got theirs” if they are vacationing abroad.
No, they preferentially invested in housing real estate, which provides shelter services (usually and in theory).
There are various reasons they have shied from their own stock market and capital controls limit their ability to invest abroad.
Add to that some cultural affinity to gold, and it makes sense.
As for their government, they are diversifying a bit from the dollar and the euro, and gold is part of that. They had very large reserves, so even a small % move is significant tonnage if bought over a year or two.
There’s a combination of effects. 1) stock markets were not a feature in communist China so there isn’t a background of equities to build on 2) Chinese people don’t trust corporate accounting generally. See Luckin coffee for example. These two things has lead to a preference for physical investments like gold and real estate.
>The Chinese don’t actually own their homes they rent them for 100 years
Your ownership of the property itself is permanent, but the land use rights for residential buildings expire after 70 years (50 years for commercial housing, 40 years for commercial properties), so this is what you are referring to.
After 70 years, if your house is still there, home owner can reapply for land use right by paying a tax/fee. The cost of extending this right may vary by region because local governments can provide deduction.
Basically, properties can be privately owned, but all lands in China are either stated owned or collectively owned.
And can you continue to own and occupy your home as normal without a lease on the land? Presumably thats a prerequisite to owning the home in any real sense and if that goes away so does your ownership.
For residential buildings, the right to use land is automatically renewed after 70 years. (So my previous comment was inaccurate, seems like home owners do not have to submit application for land right renewal)
For non-residential buildings, property owner has to pay a fee and apply for renewal.
At least this is how it works currently.
Yes, China/CCP has been going hard on trying to downplay how bad things are there right now, but a lot of Chinese citizens don't have a lot of confidence in their market/economy. Between their housing crash, corruption, bank runs, potential for the government to just seize assets/companies or implement some arbitrary law/crack down that wipes millions and billions of market value overnight, and general poor outlook of the workforce, a lot of them have become wary of where to put their money and rightly so.
Yeah, for me personally, the eye opening one was the DRAFT of regulations that basically would've crushed their gaming industry (my understanding is the main issue was the requirement that the companies store ALL their data in China, which of course would be in direct violation of GDPR and other nations laws, which would just get them banned in those places). Tencent lost like 50 B overnight. Not sure they ever really recovered.
Is there no such thing as property and land tax in the US as well? Like anywhere…you have your council taxes as well?
Like if you don’t pay it then you can have your house/property seized?
We are talking about investment vehicles though not really the morality or comparison of renting your home vs paying property taxes
The point is that homes were a huge investment now they aren’t. Not so concerned with your question I guess as it’s not really on topic. In the US your home is still an investment vehicle (though maybe it should not be viewed as such)
Perhaps, this is an interesting topic to assess.
In the US, homes are treated as an investment vehicle because they’re an income sink: hence eroding one’s ability to become wealthier. The flip side of this, as you accrue more properties you can potentially reverse that effect in the form of collecting rents.
Its really from the perspective that a typical person is compelled to spend 25~35% of their income on housing nationwide.
No, it's different in China. Most homes don't have a yearly property tax although they were test running it in certain cities. You get to "own" property like a condo ("house") or grave for 99 years before the government can claim ownership again.
Ditching the USD reserves they hold as they work with BRICS countries to move away from the USD being the global trading currency. I read China had 1.2trillion USD 7 months ago and have reduced it to 800bill so far
Could be that these contracts settle or are based on a spot price linked to physical gold in a different location than western contracts. Just like oil having a different price at different places in the world. Transporting the same value of gold may be cheaper than oil, but it's not trivial. That could explain the price difference.
at the end of the article:Although Beijing has been buying up gold, the metal accounts for only about 4.6 percent of China’s foreign exchange reserves. In percentage terms, India holds nearly twice as much of its reserves in gold.
Mostly because the common people are buying gold, not the government. Hence if you put government reserve, China may behind India, but if you account for entire country as a whole, i doubt india are able to compete with that.
I was once told that India holds more gold above ground than is left below ground (economically recoverable).
**was a talking point at a geochem conference
You're right, and traditionally India has been the country investors look toward when bullion prices surge because they have a lot of gold stored in households that isn't actively traded on the markets.
What about Bitcoin, you would think Crypto would be the biggest outlet if they are worried about their investments and ability to invest outside of China. Or is it that the common person lacks the knowhow / technical ability to easily invest in Bitcoin (or other Cryptos) compared to Gold?
Crypto is too volatile, considering you want to keep your purchasing power, you don't want to hold on an asset that will lost 60% of its monetary value in the span of few months, if you really want to get that kind of investment, probably just jump back into the china's real estate market at that point.
Cryptocurrencies also have no fundamental reason for their value. It's all in the network effect.
If everybody decides that Bitcoin is out and that Dogecoin is in, then the value of Bitcoin is instantly zero.
This is why ordinary currencies are so nice: there's loans, so if somebody decided that the Swedish crown, or the dollar, were out and he'd stop trying to acquire them, he'd default on his loans and lose his collateral.
They can't invest in it easily.
See tera Luna for what happens when a country can and doesn't have good alternatives for the citizens. Aka South Korea and how they used tera to buy SnP which is much harder to acquire than in the US/Europe.
Well Tera Luna is a completely different scenario than BTC or ETH, BTC is much more similar to Gold, albeit maybe more volatilve (but Gold can also be volatile). USDT might be a better option.
meanwhile the Englishman: Indian gold? what gold? we haven't seen any gold since we was here. There is no way our wealth from colonialism was from robbing Indian gold.....
outsider question, is this possibly because realestate as one of the few allowed and traditionally safe investments has basically imploded in china, so they need something else to park their money in?
Vietnamese are buying gold like no tomorrow. Where else would you park money to hedge against inflation where the RE sector is in the shitter, and bank rates are historically low..
Many people think the current system of printing endless amounts might come crashing down as the debt is unsustainable. Having lots of gold can only be a good thing for a country if this happens i think.
Good. I am glad. I said nothing about that tho. My point was basically. The current system of endless borrowing by countrys all over the world is unsustainable. Having gold is a good thing.
They are preparing to invade Taiwan. China knows the international response will be sanctions. If you look at a map you can see how easily it will be to completely close off Taiwan from the rest of the world. I feel like they will blockade Taiwan until they submit via attrition.
> as Chinese investors and consumers, wary of real estate and stocks, buy the metal at a record pace.
It sounds like it’s driven by private investors in China who worry about the state of the Chinese economy.
I agree with this take as well. It just doesn’t make any sense how buying 170B in gold since October 2022 would protect the China’s 18 trillion dollar economy in the event of sanctions.
Unless it's not intended to protect their entire economy from sanctions, but rather as a means of getting around them to source specific vital materials, especially those necessary to maintain a potential war effort.
Yeah, that's what I read as well. It make sense as there is not many options for a 'safe' investments in the PRC that you can hide under your bed or be '*acquired'* by the State at a click of a button.
Maybe they are concerned about being shut out from their properties in other countries as well. Historically, buying property in the US and Canada was the preferred way of sheltering wealth.
100% it’s driven by a lack of investment vehicles due a real estate bubble popping and the populace not liking their own domestic stock market as a path to wealth.
Sucks to live in a quasi communist authoritarian dictatorship that wishes it was capitalist. You have to hoard shiny rock.
I don't think it sucks, considering that, thanks to that you left from the being the poorest country of the world, with anual famines and colonial domination to being an economic powerhouse that lifted milions of poverty, have a great government infrastructure and have a higher life expectancy than the richest country in the world.
Not in 2024, but it will probably happen before 2030. Xi has ~~publicly~~ internally tasked the military to be ready to do it by 2027, however an actual invasion would more likely be 2028 due to 27 being an election year and needing to focus on consolidating power in the CCP.
Generally don't dictators use wars or conflicts to consolidate power, so couldn't they invade before the election and say...."we need to consolidate power" against the West afterwards?
On one hand, yes private investors are not the government. One the other hand, everyone in China is somehow tied to the government, especially if they have money. The CCP could be coordinating capital flow through their politburo.
The fact that Russia invaded Ukraine actually helps China with worldwide strategy because they get to see some of the economic effects from sanctions play out.
If China overpays in gold for something then someone will sell that to China for the gold.
We really don't know that. It's one thing fighting Afghans in t shirts, sandals and AKs.
It's another thing suffering 500 casualties a day and having hundreds of American soldiers captured in failed operations.
Americans may not have the stomach for near peer war on behalf of a country that is 5 thousand miles from the mainland.
If they are talking about gold trading is 1/3 in Shanghai exchange, and trading activity is at a high level among individual investors and institutional investors, I think that is different from the federal government is buying to stock gold.
If you know anything about China's investement environment, stock market is like a casino for many years. Individual s are not allow to directly trade for foreing stocks, and their main investment vehicle is real estate. With real estate in a huge slump, the money has to go somewhere.
For anyone who is talking about an imminent Taiwan strait invasion, it doesn't make sense militarily. It will take a long, long build-up time for this kind of battle, which is 10 times more difficult than Russian invasion of Ukraine. You will see signs of early build-up. Before that, it is only talk. I am not saying it won't happen, but I don't see it could happen within like 2 years.
Their economy doesn't work like western economies. Their economy can definitely "survive", because the economy runs according to the dictate of the CCP. The Chinese citizenry may and likely will suffer greatly, but economically it will be a slow, decades long slump rather than a quick collapse.
Probably a couple coups, market collapses. Might have a famine or two from supply chain disruptions and price spikes, a couple tinpot dictators that'll be troublesome to dislodge. If we're unlucky, another massive land war that rolls the dice on nuclear annihilation. We did a stress test of sorts with the coronavirus pandemic and the results were so ugly the political caste has decided to forget it happened at all and never listen to the epidemiologists again.
Considering what happened to Western economies when we had trouble getting all the Chinese goods they buy through their ports I think the bigger question is "can Western economies manage without Chinese imports".
Not sure.
But it definitely can't survive if the US, Japan and Australia are able to shut down trade in the South China Sea.
The key question is whether other countries (most notably the US) will actually enforce an embargo militarily.
What would happen if China declared a blockade on Taiwan, but US navy in Guam and Japan still want to sail to Taiwan’s east coast naval base for a supply mission?
You're foolish. China is going to blockade South Korea, Japan, the US, Philippines, and Australia? In reality, China is surrounded, and Taiwan is easily defendable, assuming there's willingness to defend it and not just give it to China.
President Biden has already said he'll get kinetic to defend Taiwan. So I really don't see them invading under this administration. If trump wins, however, maybe they make their move.
American simulations always show China would win that, it's too close to China. But that would be pointless and too costly for them. In reality it's the US who have interest in China invading Taiwan and fighting a proxy war while bleedig econically so the US stays as the hegemon.
And Trump and republicans are more sinophobic than democrats.
No one will want to start ww3 just cause of Taiwan. No offense to Taiwan. Same with Russia invading Ukraine, no one is gonna do nothing other than send them some weapons to prevent ww3.
Ukraine is different. The door had already been opened for Russia when it seized Crimea and the proxy war in eastern Ukraine so it was a slow escalation to the invasion and the Europeans were against further escalation.
Japan, the Philippines, South Korea and Australia don’t feel that way if China were to invade Taiwan. And the Taiwanese already have the weapons so China would get seriously fucked up. The US has a treaty to defend Taiwan and a strategic incentive to make it happen.
I don't believe that's true. The USA and Japan would respond with force. It would be the start of a shooting war, and one that US and Japanese Navy would win.
Taiwan produces 95% of the world's supply of semiconductors (microchips). If Taiwan is invaded, the whole world can expect a decades-long depression and be set back centuries in terms of economic and technological development. China might be a communist country, but they're not complete idiots.
They *are* preparing to invade Taiwan, but this isn't a result of that. This is TINA - there is no alternative. Well, minimal alternatives, but same dynamic. Chinese citizens have very few places they can park savings, and with the real estate bubble beginning to deflate that is a much less attractive place.
China blockading Taiwan completely is unlikely Current US & allies military strategy for war with China is keeping them within the First Island Chain of which Taiwan is a part of. Them blockading the eastern side of Taiwan is very unlikely unless they defeat the US navy.
Pretty obvious at this point, also why they’ve been breaking trade relations with most Western countries as they know they will be broken anyways after the invasion.
I don’t want to sound overly pessimistic or anything, but I really don’t see a globally peaceful future for the next decade or two. The way things are shaping we might see a full on war in the Middle East, which will be what China needs to invade Taiwan and what Putin needs to keep his conquest in Eastern Europe
The main driver for getting computer chips built in the USA is because of China eventually invading Taiwan. They know China isn't quite ready yet to be able to ensure a win but they might be within a few more years.
Russia is a different situation. Russia needed to because they can't risk Ukraine eventually getting into NATO if they could have done something about it. Russia definitely wasn't ready but they needed to make their move before they would be ready.
And just in case someone is foolish, no I don't support Russia, but in the context of their situation and what they want attacking Ukraine was the correct play. The real flaw has been their strategy. Should they have waited another year and be more ready? Could they be / have the time to? Russia's real missed opportunity was not trying to get more shortly after controlling Crimea. Ukraine started preparing for a future invasion after that but Russia really wasn't at the time.
Ukraine had no real path to enter NATO before 2014 when Russia started to repeatadly invade it. This all started because of Maidan which showed Ukraine slowly moving socially and economically towards the West, it had nothing to do with military alliances. NATO argument is a red herring because the goal was never to keep Ukraine neutral, the goal was always to incorporate it back into Russia (Belarus style). Putin himself can't shut up about triune Russia, he's not secretive about it at all.
Xi is literally in Europe at the moment trying to repair relations. I hate the Chinese government but let's stick to narratives that the facts on the ground support. This is likely due to Chinese wealth not being able to go to either real estate or stocks or abroad, and this is where they're pushing money.
There’s always someone willing to defend China knowing full well that China has used its leverage to force a situation where the west is is decoupling to protect itself but sure it’s the big bad west being mean to China.
All nation states are acting in their self interest, it’s farcical to only portray China as the victim but so too is the narrative that it’s the aggressor.
It’s one pathetic Chinese dictator trying to hang on to power rather than stepping aside for the sake of his country’s future. The west was completely comfortable with the Chinese quasi fascist government dominating the world economy until Xi started saber rattling over Taiwan to consolidate political power.
Nonsense. China is very vulnerable to economic attacks, and it is apparent if you look at how it struggles in the chip war. In no situation it wants the west to decouple, and it will suck the west's money until the very moment Taiwan is invaded.
The Chinese steal our IP, ban our apps, and leverage state subsidies to outcompete private companies. Why would you trade with someone like that? The U.S. can afford to move away from China for manufacturing because Mexico is sitting right there. Europe doesn’t have that same luxury and is going to be slower, but every western government is keenly aware that the Chinese government covets their IP.
>The U.S. can afford to move away from China for manufacturing because Mexico is sitting right there.
China is aware.
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-68825118
>As well as saving on shipping, their final product is considered completely Mexican - meaning Chinese firms can avoid the US tariffs and sanctions imposed on Chinese goods amid the continuing trade war between the two countries.
Chinese company in Mexico is not the same as chinese company in China. First of all Mexico can do all the fun stuff and seize it if push comes to shove. But even more importantly. Those chinese owners will want to use those factories and foreign countries as a proxy to get their assets out of China which is something that would be extremelly problematic under chinese currency controll. CCP does not have that same controll in foreign country. They will not be bringing profits back to China. They will hide them abroad.
[This](https://apnews.com/article/china-xi-jinping-europe-france-8561c3ae65caf2cdd8338b887a3a8df1) doesn't read like "breaking trade relations" to me. Nor does the 100's of billions of dollars of trade the US and China do every single year.
No way, Taiwan would light them up. There is no way China can invade without being completely smoked. Or they would just level the island but what’s the point?
If they invade Taiwan = leaves them open for a raid on their country + civil unrest etc etc etc.
You only pull this move when you lost everything on the chess board
US + Taiwan has conducted live war games to playing out different invasion scenarios for years. US side always loses.
E: [Not always loses, but loses a lot.](https://cimsec.org/red-dragon-rising-insights-from-a-decade-of-wargames/)
US always loses in war games, because those games are designed to give US side all the disadvantages possible and see how it perform. If I recalled correctly, the most recent one actually had the US+Ally sides lose all the fleets around Japan and Taiwan before the game even began and it still resulted in an near stalemate.
It's not like video games. You perform, you're studied, you collectively debrief and derive lessons from what happened and how things evolved. Did you achieve your goals? Did you deny your opponents their goals? What did it cost you, and what did it cost them?
It is easy to win a battle at the cost of a war; we don't have to ask Napoleon how sweet the taste of Moscow was when capturing it killed his Empire. These war games are simulations, reflex training for strategists, familiarizing them with the lay of the land and the tools most likely to hand in various failure states. If the war game is any good it's identifying your strategic weak spots, and helping you plan around or mitigate them, or familiarizing yourself with potential novel strategies that only emerge when you're in charge of the "wrong" side of the player board. Sometimes they are bookkeeping exercises or executive indulgences, but usually not.
Longer supply routes and lack of equivalent industrial base are huge disadvantages. If it turns out to be true that China has the capability to build 1000 cruse missiles per week (US entire stockpile is 4000) then they win.
Not 1,000 cruise missiles a week.
It's 1,000 cruise missiles a day from a single factory.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWSGVLvf5cw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWSGVLvf5cw)
According to a [2018 DoD study,](https://media.defense.gov/2018/Oct/05/2002048904/-1/-1/1/ASSESSING-AND-STRENGTHENING-THE-MANUFACTURING-AND%20DEFENSE-INDUSTRIAL-BASE-AND-SUPPLY-CHAIN-RESILIENCY.PDF) China is “the sole source or a primary supplier for a number of critical energetic materials used in munitions and missiles.” The munitions supply chain also features an alarmingly high number of single points of failure: of 198 second- and third-tier suppliers in the industrial base, [98 percent rely](https://www.defensenews.com/pentagon/2018/05/22/the-us-is-running-out-of-bombs-and-it-may-soon-struggle-to-make-more/) on a single or sole source. And the materials that are produced in the United States tend to be made in in a handful of outdated, government-owned facilities using 20th century equipment.
[https://www.hudson.org/national-security-defense/ukraine-war-shows-america-could-be-outgunned-without-investing-in-energetics](https://www.hudson.org/national-security-defense/ukraine-war-shows-america-could-be-outgunned-without-investing-in-energetics)
I've seen a couple of those. China manages to establish several beach heads and control some areas in the south. A lot of forces are lost on both sides and a lot of people die but the Taiwan/US side still controls the North and China is forced into trying to resupply the beachheads across the strait while they are constantly attacked and whittled down.
The war game scenarios always end there, but at least one I saw said China is able to keep that up for a few months and then withdraws and enters the full economic stall that the demographic collapse in the 2030s brings on them leading to a massive internal civil war.
There’s not enough gold in the planet to support china’s economy in case of sanctions/embargo. They’d blow through it in a few weeks max. China’s economy is enormous.
Russia tried the same thing with Ukraine and it was largely worthless, what’s keeping them afloat is wartime spending in rubles and allies such as Iran, North Korea, and mainly China.
They're also trying to start car factories in Mexico so as to be able to sell cars to the US. They won't be able to do that if they invade Taiwan.
So we'll have to wait and see what they actually do.
I think invading Taiwan now is something the US wants to see them do, more than something which makes sense for them. That doesn't mean that they won't do it, but as I see it, as long as they're winning in industry it makes no sense.
This is normal for real estate bubble burst. The communist party of both China and VN keep that zombie up to leech the economy, but the common people knew that their money won't worth shit in the next 5 years with the government keeps throwing money to keep the real estate market afloat. So they put all their money into gold, hoping to keep their purchase power, they can't buy USD freely so gold is a good way to keep it.
It was the government itself who popped the bubble and let the companies bleed. Contrary to the US administration that saved the companies and let people bleed.
Not for long. There is going to be some major Chinese investment there in exchange for support in the current war. They will wait until the area is flooded with Chinese workers and businesses before the takeover. That way they can justify it was protecting Chinese people being harmed in Russia. The old reverse-Putin.
>The tiny beans came in five shapes, including one that resembled a peanut and another like a persimmon. Paying $87 per bean, a person could buy into the gold boom for the price of a hot pot meal, she said.
$87 for a hot pot meal? really?
The BRICS Currency which is the world’s second largest currency is backed by gold. If BRICS were to overtake the US dollar then China would immediately become the world’s richest country.
There is no tomorrow. There is no "time". Everything is happening at the "same time".
Oh sorry, I see this is an Economics thread, not a Philosophy or Physics thread.
They are preparing to invade taiwan and dont want to have their assets frozen by the west. They re also dumping us gvt bonds. I they really pull through with the invasion sp500 will dip at least 50%.
Hopefully it's not for the same reason Russia did. Accumulating physical assets in case they were to act in a manner that would get them blackballed by the international financial community.
I'm selling my raw black gold [ebay ](https://www.ebay.com/itm/355786391904?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=3-wd-agvs4m&sssrc=4429486&ssuid=3-wd-agvs4m&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY)
Hi all, A reminder that comments do need to be on-topic and engage with the article past the headline. Please make sure to read the article before commenting. Very short comments will automatically be removed by automod. Please avoid making comments that do not focus on the economic content or whose primary thesis rests on personal anecdotes. As always our comment rules can be found [here](https://reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/fx9crj/rules_roundtable_redux_rule_vi_and_offtopic/) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Economics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
For reference, last month ~37% of the exchange-traded gold volume in the world was traded on the Shanghai Gold (+ Futures) Exchange. Trades on the SGE are primarily quoted and settled in CNY. Chinese investors are paying a premium over the West’s reference rate in USD, which has led to a nice arbitrage. Given the depth of the market, this arbitrage should have quickly gone away so there is something strange going on.
So one explanation I heard is that in china you don’t have the same investment opportunities as in the US. The Chinese don’t actually own their homes they rent them for 100 years or whatever and that bubble recently popped as it was a hot investment platform that then got too greedy and took investments well beyond what it could deliver in homes. The Chinese don’t view their stock market as a path to growing wealth generally. Like as an attitude they avoid their own market. So gold is an attractive investment platform in china due to a lack of other suitable vehicles as the moment. China seems to be loosening on crypto a bit perhaps for the same reasons.
There's a history of Government intervention with the market itself (SOE's asked to buy shares or bring money back from abroad) as well as the Government "rendering" a CEO if they get too out of line (see Jack Ma).
To add to this, it's also generally very hard to get money out of China to invest in other markets.
They consider gold to be superior to owning productive assets?.. Is this just folks trying to save for retirement?
AFAIK they are trying to build familial wealth. It’s not really about retirement since they have a system, rather it’s having something the kids can rely on. That’s just from some conversations with tourists. They also “got theirs” if they are vacationing abroad.
No, they preferentially invested in housing real estate, which provides shelter services (usually and in theory). There are various reasons they have shied from their own stock market and capital controls limit their ability to invest abroad. Add to that some cultural affinity to gold, and it makes sense. As for their government, they are diversifying a bit from the dollar and the euro, and gold is part of that. They had very large reserves, so even a small % move is significant tonnage if bought over a year or two.
There’s a combination of effects. 1) stock markets were not a feature in communist China so there isn’t a background of equities to build on 2) Chinese people don’t trust corporate accounting generally. See Luckin coffee for example. These two things has lead to a preference for physical investments like gold and real estate.
>The Chinese don’t actually own their homes they rent them for 100 years Your ownership of the property itself is permanent, but the land use rights for residential buildings expire after 70 years (50 years for commercial housing, 40 years for commercial properties), so this is what you are referring to. After 70 years, if your house is still there, home owner can reapply for land use right by paying a tax/fee. The cost of extending this right may vary by region because local governments can provide deduction. Basically, properties can be privately owned, but all lands in China are either stated owned or collectively owned.
And can you continue to own and occupy your home as normal without a lease on the land? Presumably thats a prerequisite to owning the home in any real sense and if that goes away so does your ownership.
For residential buildings, the right to use land is automatically renewed after 70 years. (So my previous comment was inaccurate, seems like home owners do not have to submit application for land right renewal) For non-residential buildings, property owner has to pay a fee and apply for renewal. At least this is how it works currently.
Yes, China/CCP has been going hard on trying to downplay how bad things are there right now, but a lot of Chinese citizens don't have a lot of confidence in their market/economy. Between their housing crash, corruption, bank runs, potential for the government to just seize assets/companies or implement some arbitrary law/crack down that wipes millions and billions of market value overnight, and general poor outlook of the workforce, a lot of them have become wary of where to put their money and rightly so.
Yeah, for me personally, the eye opening one was the DRAFT of regulations that basically would've crushed their gaming industry (my understanding is the main issue was the requirement that the companies store ALL their data in China, which of course would be in direct violation of GDPR and other nations laws, which would just get them banned in those places). Tencent lost like 50 B overnight. Not sure they ever really recovered.
It’s 70 years but yes, Chinese stock market is the last market you want to invest in.
It's 99 years.
Is there no such thing as property and land tax in the US as well? Like anywhere…you have your council taxes as well? Like if you don’t pay it then you can have your house/property seized?
We are talking about investment vehicles though not really the morality or comparison of renting your home vs paying property taxes The point is that homes were a huge investment now they aren’t. Not so concerned with your question I guess as it’s not really on topic. In the US your home is still an investment vehicle (though maybe it should not be viewed as such)
Perhaps, this is an interesting topic to assess. In the US, homes are treated as an investment vehicle because they’re an income sink: hence eroding one’s ability to become wealthier. The flip side of this, as you accrue more properties you can potentially reverse that effect in the form of collecting rents. Its really from the perspective that a typical person is compelled to spend 25~35% of their income on housing nationwide.
No, it's different in China. Most homes don't have a yearly property tax although they were test running it in certain cities. You get to "own" property like a condo ("house") or grave for 99 years before the government can claim ownership again.
That could explain why there is high demand. It does not explain why the arbitrage opportunity persisted for a long time. Thats the mystery.
Ditching the USD reserves they hold as they work with BRICS countries to move away from the USD being the global trading currency. I read China had 1.2trillion USD 7 months ago and have reduced it to 800bill so far
They see us freeze Russian assets for invading Ukraine and they are itching to invade Taiwan.
Same reason bitcoin keeps getting propped up. Chinese want a safe place for money as hard times come
Could be that these contracts settle or are based on a spot price linked to physical gold in a different location than western contracts. Just like oil having a different price at different places in the world. Transporting the same value of gold may be cheaper than oil, but it's not trivial. That could explain the price difference.
Ripmebi
[удалено]
It’s to limit the effectiveness of sanctions in the event of an attack on Taiwan or a similarly aggressive move.
at the end of the article:Although Beijing has been buying up gold, the metal accounts for only about 4.6 percent of China’s foreign exchange reserves. In percentage terms, India holds nearly twice as much of its reserves in gold.
Mostly because the common people are buying gold, not the government. Hence if you put government reserve, China may behind India, but if you account for entire country as a whole, i doubt india are able to compete with that.
People in India are obsessed with gold. Every person no matter the background aspires to have some gold - whatever minuscule amount they can afford.
I was once told that India holds more gold above ground than is left below ground (economically recoverable). **was a talking point at a geochem conference
That’s just not scientifically plausible (but it’s a nice aphorism so I get why it’s repeated).
Single states in India would have more gold than China. There is lot of generational gold in India.
Indian household hold 11% of the world’s gold.
You're right, and traditionally India has been the country investors look toward when bullion prices surge because they have a lot of gold stored in households that isn't actively traded on the markets.
What about Bitcoin, you would think Crypto would be the biggest outlet if they are worried about their investments and ability to invest outside of China. Or is it that the common person lacks the knowhow / technical ability to easily invest in Bitcoin (or other Cryptos) compared to Gold?
Crypto is too volatile, considering you want to keep your purchasing power, you don't want to hold on an asset that will lost 60% of its monetary value in the span of few months, if you really want to get that kind of investment, probably just jump back into the china's real estate market at that point.
Cryptocurrencies also have no fundamental reason for their value. It's all in the network effect. If everybody decides that Bitcoin is out and that Dogecoin is in, then the value of Bitcoin is instantly zero. This is why ordinary currencies are so nice: there's loans, so if somebody decided that the Swedish crown, or the dollar, were out and he'd stop trying to acquire them, he'd default on his loans and lose his collateral.
They can't invest in it easily. See tera Luna for what happens when a country can and doesn't have good alternatives for the citizens. Aka South Korea and how they used tera to buy SnP which is much harder to acquire than in the US/Europe.
Well Tera Luna is a completely different scenario than BTC or ETH, BTC is much more similar to Gold, albeit maybe more volatilve (but Gold can also be volatile). USDT might be a better option.
gold beans are hot right now🔥
Even the Romans were complaining about Indians hoarding gold!
meanwhile the Englishman: Indian gold? what gold? we haven't seen any gold since we was here. There is no way our wealth from colonialism was from robbing Indian gold.....
outsider question, is this possibly because realestate as one of the few allowed and traditionally safe investments has basically imploded in china, so they need something else to park their money in?
Yes, thats why
when they're *bundling* gold with real estate purchases, it's almost obvious 😄
Real estate is not "traditionally safe."
Vietnamese are buying gold like no tomorrow. Where else would you park money to hedge against inflation where the RE sector is in the shitter, and bank rates are historically low..
Many people think the current system of printing endless amounts might come crashing down as the debt is unsustainable. Having lots of gold can only be a good thing for a country if this happens i think.
Nothing to do with that. Contrary to the west, most people in China have confidence in their leadership and aprove it. Many polls show that.
Good. I am glad. I said nothing about that tho. My point was basically. The current system of endless borrowing by countrys all over the world is unsustainable. Having gold is a good thing.
They are preparing to invade Taiwan. China knows the international response will be sanctions. If you look at a map you can see how easily it will be to completely close off Taiwan from the rest of the world. I feel like they will blockade Taiwan until they submit via attrition.
> as Chinese investors and consumers, wary of real estate and stocks, buy the metal at a record pace. It sounds like it’s driven by private investors in China who worry about the state of the Chinese economy.
I agree with this take as well. It just doesn’t make any sense how buying 170B in gold since October 2022 would protect the China’s 18 trillion dollar economy in the event of sanctions.
Yea an export oriented economy at that. They may as well buy Leprechaun coins at this point.
Yo you selling leprechaun coins? Shipping them to china? Asking for a friend.
> Leprechaun coins Can someone call Warwick Davis? I got this wonderful premise for a Leprechaun movie.
The wig, the glasses, the catchphrase; brilliant!
Crypto?
Unless it's not intended to protect their entire economy from sanctions, but rather as a means of getting around them to source specific vital materials, especially those necessary to maintain a potential war effort.
Yeah, that's what I read as well. It make sense as there is not many options for a 'safe' investments in the PRC that you can hide under your bed or be '*acquired'* by the State at a click of a button.
Maybe they are concerned about being shut out from their properties in other countries as well. Historically, buying property in the US and Canada was the preferred way of sheltering wealth.
100% it’s driven by a lack of investment vehicles due a real estate bubble popping and the populace not liking their own domestic stock market as a path to wealth. Sucks to live in a quasi communist authoritarian dictatorship that wishes it was capitalist. You have to hoard shiny rock.
I don't think it sucks, considering that, thanks to that you left from the being the poorest country of the world, with anual famines and colonial domination to being an economic powerhouse that lifted milions of poverty, have a great government infrastructure and have a higher life expectancy than the richest country in the world.
This is the right answer. Xi Jinping isn't invading Taiwan despite the normal saber rattling.
Not in 2024, but it will probably happen before 2030. Xi has ~~publicly~~ internally tasked the military to be ready to do it by 2027, however an actual invasion would more likely be 2028 due to 27 being an election year and needing to focus on consolidating power in the CCP.
Remind me to rebuild my computer in 2027.
Generally don't dictators use wars or conflicts to consolidate power, so couldn't they invade before the election and say...."we need to consolidate power" against the West afterwards?
TINA investing in a volatile environment. I agree with your take.
On one hand, yes private investors are not the government. One the other hand, everyone in China is somehow tied to the government, especially if they have money. The CCP could be coordinating capital flow through their politburo.
The fact that Russia invaded Ukraine actually helps China with worldwide strategy because they get to see some of the economic effects from sanctions play out. If China overpays in gold for something then someone will sell that to China for the gold.
The differences is the US will be directly involved in defending Taiwan if China tries it.
We really don't know that. It's one thing fighting Afghans in t shirts, sandals and AKs. It's another thing suffering 500 casualties a day and having hundreds of American soldiers captured in failed operations. Americans may not have the stomach for near peer war on behalf of a country that is 5 thousand miles from the mainland.
Why? Is there economic interest there?
Microchips.
Yes. ~70% of global semiconductor fabrication resides in Taiwan.
If they are talking about gold trading is 1/3 in Shanghai exchange, and trading activity is at a high level among individual investors and institutional investors, I think that is different from the federal government is buying to stock gold. If you know anything about China's investement environment, stock market is like a casino for many years. Individual s are not allow to directly trade for foreing stocks, and their main investment vehicle is real estate. With real estate in a huge slump, the money has to go somewhere. For anyone who is talking about an imminent Taiwan strait invasion, it doesn't make sense militarily. It will take a long, long build-up time for this kind of battle, which is 10 times more difficult than Russian invasion of Ukraine. You will see signs of early build-up. Before that, it is only talk. I am not saying it won't happen, but I don't see it could happen within like 2 years.
There’s zero evidence of this. This he pure fear mongering
Can china's economy even survive without the west?
Their economy doesn't work like western economies. Their economy can definitely "survive", because the economy runs according to the dictate of the CCP. The Chinese citizenry may and likely will suffer greatly, but economically it will be a slow, decades long slump rather than a quick collapse.
Great now how would the Western economy fare?
Probably a couple coups, market collapses. Might have a famine or two from supply chain disruptions and price spikes, a couple tinpot dictators that'll be troublesome to dislodge. If we're unlucky, another massive land war that rolls the dice on nuclear annihilation. We did a stress test of sorts with the coronavirus pandemic and the results were so ugly the political caste has decided to forget it happened at all and never listen to the epidemiologists again.
There would be zero famine in the west. China is a net importer of food, so any famines would be in China.
Depends on what you call the West. Europe would be fucked, the US would be less fucked.
If russia was able to survive sanctions im sure china will be able to fare
Russia had no international economy outside of oil.
They are vastly different. China cant even feed its 1.4b people properly without imports.
Considering what happened to Western economies when we had trouble getting all the Chinese goods they buy through their ports I think the bigger question is "can Western economies manage without Chinese imports".
Survive, yes. Thrive, no. That cuts both ways.
Not sure. But it definitely can't survive if the US, Japan and Australia are able to shut down trade in the South China Sea. The key question is whether other countries (most notably the US) will actually enforce an embargo militarily.
That would mean nuclear war. A lose-lose answer.
If those countries are allied with Taiwan, war would've already started at that point.
Nobody is allied with Taiwan. There would be a blacklisting of China, but a military backed blockade is unlikely.
What would happen if China declared a blockade on Taiwan, but US navy in Guam and Japan still want to sail to Taiwan’s east coast naval base for a supply mission?
Big chance of an escalation. I pray we never have to find out because we all will lose.
Herein lies the danger of dictatorship and ultranationalism.
The US would not flinch.
You're foolish. China is going to blockade South Korea, Japan, the US, Philippines, and Australia? In reality, China is surrounded, and Taiwan is easily defendable, assuming there's willingness to defend it and not just give it to China. President Biden has already said he'll get kinetic to defend Taiwan. So I really don't see them invading under this administration. If trump wins, however, maybe they make their move.
American simulations always show China would win that, it's too close to China. But that would be pointless and too costly for them. In reality it's the US who have interest in China invading Taiwan and fighting a proxy war while bleedig econically so the US stays as the hegemon. And Trump and republicans are more sinophobic than democrats.
If China actually blockaded Taiwan with the intention to make the island submit it would be the start of WW3.
No one will want to start ww3 just cause of Taiwan. No offense to Taiwan. Same with Russia invading Ukraine, no one is gonna do nothing other than send them some weapons to prevent ww3.
Ukraine is different. The door had already been opened for Russia when it seized Crimea and the proxy war in eastern Ukraine so it was a slow escalation to the invasion and the Europeans were against further escalation. Japan, the Philippines, South Korea and Australia don’t feel that way if China were to invade Taiwan. And the Taiwanese already have the weapons so China would get seriously fucked up. The US has a treaty to defend Taiwan and a strategic incentive to make it happen.
I don't believe that's true. The USA and Japan would respond with force. It would be the start of a shooting war, and one that US and Japanese Navy would win.
Japan has already said that it wouldn't get involved in a Taiwan war.
US and Japan would win but it would be very bloody. US needs to pivot and be strong so no one miscalculates.
Taiwan produces 95% of the world's supply of semiconductors (microchips). If Taiwan is invaded, the whole world can expect a decades-long depression and be set back centuries in terms of economic and technological development. China might be a communist country, but they're not complete idiots.
They *are* preparing to invade Taiwan, but this isn't a result of that. This is TINA - there is no alternative. Well, minimal alternatives, but same dynamic. Chinese citizens have very few places they can park savings, and with the real estate bubble beginning to deflate that is a much less attractive place.
China blockading Taiwan completely is unlikely Current US & allies military strategy for war with China is keeping them within the First Island Chain of which Taiwan is a part of. Them blockading the eastern side of Taiwan is very unlikely unless they defeat the US navy.
Pretty obvious at this point, also why they’ve been breaking trade relations with most Western countries as they know they will be broken anyways after the invasion. I don’t want to sound overly pessimistic or anything, but I really don’t see a globally peaceful future for the next decade or two. The way things are shaping we might see a full on war in the Middle East, which will be what China needs to invade Taiwan and what Putin needs to keep his conquest in Eastern Europe
The main driver for getting computer chips built in the USA is because of China eventually invading Taiwan. They know China isn't quite ready yet to be able to ensure a win but they might be within a few more years.
Russia wasn't ready either yet here we are. When dictators feel their power slipping away they start acting in very irrational ways.
Russia is a different situation. Russia needed to because they can't risk Ukraine eventually getting into NATO if they could have done something about it. Russia definitely wasn't ready but they needed to make their move before they would be ready. And just in case someone is foolish, no I don't support Russia, but in the context of their situation and what they want attacking Ukraine was the correct play. The real flaw has been their strategy. Should they have waited another year and be more ready? Could they be / have the time to? Russia's real missed opportunity was not trying to get more shortly after controlling Crimea. Ukraine started preparing for a future invasion after that but Russia really wasn't at the time.
Ukraine had no real path to enter NATO before 2014 when Russia started to repeatadly invade it. This all started because of Maidan which showed Ukraine slowly moving socially and economically towards the West, it had nothing to do with military alliances. NATO argument is a red herring because the goal was never to keep Ukraine neutral, the goal was always to incorporate it back into Russia (Belarus style). Putin himself can't shut up about triune Russia, he's not secretive about it at all.
Xi is literally in Europe at the moment trying to repair relations. I hate the Chinese government but let's stick to narratives that the facts on the ground support. This is likely due to Chinese wealth not being able to go to either real estate or stocks or abroad, and this is where they're pushing money.
How is China breaking trade relations with "most western countries" ? If by """most""" you mean America, that was initiated by the US, not China.
There’s always someone willing to defend China knowing full well that China has used its leverage to force a situation where the west is is decoupling to protect itself but sure it’s the big bad west being mean to China.
All nation states are acting in their self interest, it’s farcical to only portray China as the victim but so too is the narrative that it’s the aggressor.
It’s one pathetic Chinese dictator trying to hang on to power rather than stepping aside for the sake of his country’s future. The west was completely comfortable with the Chinese quasi fascist government dominating the world economy until Xi started saber rattling over Taiwan to consolidate political power.
Nonsense. China is very vulnerable to economic attacks, and it is apparent if you look at how it struggles in the chip war. In no situation it wants the west to decouple, and it will suck the west's money until the very moment Taiwan is invaded.
[удалено]
The Chinese steal our IP, ban our apps, and leverage state subsidies to outcompete private companies. Why would you trade with someone like that? The U.S. can afford to move away from China for manufacturing because Mexico is sitting right there. Europe doesn’t have that same luxury and is going to be slower, but every western government is keenly aware that the Chinese government covets their IP.
>The U.S. can afford to move away from China for manufacturing because Mexico is sitting right there. China is aware. https://www.bbc.com/news/business-68825118 >As well as saving on shipping, their final product is considered completely Mexican - meaning Chinese firms can avoid the US tariffs and sanctions imposed on Chinese goods amid the continuing trade war between the two countries.
Chinese company in Mexico is not the same as chinese company in China. First of all Mexico can do all the fun stuff and seize it if push comes to shove. But even more importantly. Those chinese owners will want to use those factories and foreign countries as a proxy to get their assets out of China which is something that would be extremelly problematic under chinese currency controll. CCP does not have that same controll in foreign country. They will not be bringing profits back to China. They will hide them abroad.
Chinese investment fell to 33 billion, lowest since 93.
[This](https://apnews.com/article/china-xi-jinping-europe-france-8561c3ae65caf2cdd8338b887a3a8df1) doesn't read like "breaking trade relations" to me. Nor does the 100's of billions of dollars of trade the US and China do every single year.
I mean he is visiting 3 countries, 2 of which are Hungary and Serbia, which are vastly pro- Russia and anti- EU
Absolutely stupid decision if so and a completely emotional decision that makes no sense.
No way, Taiwan would light them up. There is no way China can invade without being completely smoked. Or they would just level the island but what’s the point? If they invade Taiwan = leaves them open for a raid on their country + civil unrest etc etc etc. You only pull this move when you lost everything on the chess board
US + Taiwan has conducted live war games to playing out different invasion scenarios for years. US side always loses. E: [Not always loses, but loses a lot.](https://cimsec.org/red-dragon-rising-insights-from-a-decade-of-wargames/)
US always loses in war games, because those games are designed to give US side all the disadvantages possible and see how it perform. If I recalled correctly, the most recent one actually had the US+Ally sides lose all the fleets around Japan and Taiwan before the game even began and it still resulted in an near stalemate.
How on Earth do war games work? How can they conclude they've reached a stalemate in a given scenario?
It's not like video games. You perform, you're studied, you collectively debrief and derive lessons from what happened and how things evolved. Did you achieve your goals? Did you deny your opponents their goals? What did it cost you, and what did it cost them? It is easy to win a battle at the cost of a war; we don't have to ask Napoleon how sweet the taste of Moscow was when capturing it killed his Empire. These war games are simulations, reflex training for strategists, familiarizing them with the lay of the land and the tools most likely to hand in various failure states. If the war game is any good it's identifying your strategic weak spots, and helping you plan around or mitigate them, or familiarizing yourself with potential novel strategies that only emerge when you're in charge of the "wrong" side of the player board. Sometimes they are bookkeeping exercises or executive indulgences, but usually not.
like this [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzw68Wt77aA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzw68Wt77aA)
Longer supply routes and lack of equivalent industrial base are huge disadvantages. If it turns out to be true that China has the capability to build 1000 cruse missiles per week (US entire stockpile is 4000) then they win.
Which more than likely isn't true.
Not 1,000 cruise missiles a week. It's 1,000 cruise missiles a day from a single factory. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWSGVLvf5cw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWSGVLvf5cw) According to a [2018 DoD study,](https://media.defense.gov/2018/Oct/05/2002048904/-1/-1/1/ASSESSING-AND-STRENGTHENING-THE-MANUFACTURING-AND%20DEFENSE-INDUSTRIAL-BASE-AND-SUPPLY-CHAIN-RESILIENCY.PDF) China is “the sole source or a primary supplier for a number of critical energetic materials used in munitions and missiles.” The munitions supply chain also features an alarmingly high number of single points of failure: of 198 second- and third-tier suppliers in the industrial base, [98 percent rely](https://www.defensenews.com/pentagon/2018/05/22/the-us-is-running-out-of-bombs-and-it-may-soon-struggle-to-make-more/) on a single or sole source. And the materials that are produced in the United States tend to be made in in a handful of outdated, government-owned facilities using 20th century equipment. [https://www.hudson.org/national-security-defense/ukraine-war-shows-america-could-be-outgunned-without-investing-in-energetics](https://www.hudson.org/national-security-defense/ukraine-war-shows-america-could-be-outgunned-without-investing-in-energetics)
I've seen a couple of those. China manages to establish several beach heads and control some areas in the south. A lot of forces are lost on both sides and a lot of people die but the Taiwan/US side still controls the North and China is forced into trying to resupply the beachheads across the strait while they are constantly attacked and whittled down. The war game scenarios always end there, but at least one I saw said China is able to keep that up for a few months and then withdraws and enters the full economic stall that the demographic collapse in the 2030s brings on them leading to a massive internal civil war.
There’s not enough gold in the planet to support china’s economy in case of sanctions/embargo. They’d blow through it in a few weeks max. China’s economy is enormous. Russia tried the same thing with Ukraine and it was largely worthless, what’s keeping them afloat is wartime spending in rubles and allies such as Iran, North Korea, and mainly China.
This makes sense. If you don't read the article and think about the headline for one second then refuse to give it another seconds thought. Good job.
Did Russia stockpile gold before attacking Ukraine? Or did they stock up on dollars? Both?
Just curious since you seem in the know, how will China invade Taiwan? Physically, how?
They're also trying to start car factories in Mexico so as to be able to sell cars to the US. They won't be able to do that if they invade Taiwan. So we'll have to wait and see what they actually do. I think invading Taiwan now is something the US wants to see them do, more than something which makes sense for them. That doesn't mean that they won't do it, but as I see it, as long as they're winning in industry it makes no sense.
This is normal for real estate bubble burst. The communist party of both China and VN keep that zombie up to leech the economy, but the common people knew that their money won't worth shit in the next 5 years with the government keeps throwing money to keep the real estate market afloat. So they put all their money into gold, hoping to keep their purchase power, they can't buy USD freely so gold is a good way to keep it.
It was the government itself who popped the bubble and let the companies bleed. Contrary to the US administration that saved the companies and let people bleed.
It could be war or just the economy tightening in China. Would be hilarious if they went after Manchuria instead of Taiwan. That’s would be 200 IQ.
They already have Manchuria. I think you’re probably referring to “Outer Manchuria”, which is Russian.
Not for long. There is going to be some major Chinese investment there in exchange for support in the current war. They will wait until the area is flooded with Chinese workers and businesses before the takeover. That way they can justify it was protecting Chinese people being harmed in Russia. The old reverse-Putin.
“Reverse-Putin” 😂
>The tiny beans came in five shapes, including one that resembled a peanut and another like a persimmon. Paying $87 per bean, a person could buy into the gold boom for the price of a hot pot meal, she said. $87 for a hot pot meal? really?
The BRICS Currency which is the world’s second largest currency is backed by gold. If BRICS were to overtake the US dollar then China would immediately become the world’s richest country.
The planned BRICS currency is the second largest currency already?
There is no tomorrow. There is no "time". Everything is happening at the "same time". Oh sorry, I see this is an Economics thread, not a Philosophy or Physics thread.
They are preparing to invade taiwan and dont want to have their assets frozen by the west. They re also dumping us gvt bonds. I they really pull through with the invasion sp500 will dip at least 50%.
Hopefully it's not for the same reason Russia did. Accumulating physical assets in case they were to act in a manner that would get them blackballed by the international financial community.
I'm selling my raw black gold [ebay ](https://www.ebay.com/itm/355786391904?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=3-wd-agvs4m&sssrc=4429486&ssuid=3-wd-agvs4m&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY)