<story><title>The Macroeconomics of Chinese kleptocracy</title><url>http://brontecapital.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/macroeconomics-of-chinese-kleptocracy.html</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>cs702</author><text>There are a lot of things I don&apos;t understand about China&apos;s economy, and every time I think I might have a handle on it, I come across juicy tidbits like these ones:&lt;p&gt;* The ghost city of Ordos.  Built &lt;i&gt;on spec&lt;/i&gt; for one million residents, this city sits empty in the middle of nowhere. A lot of money went into building all its plazas, museums, parks, office buildings, and residences, but no one needs or uses any of it.[1]&lt;p&gt;* The New South China Mall, in Guangdong Province.  With nearly 10 million square feet of retail space, it&apos;s &lt;i&gt;by far&lt;/i&gt; the world&apos;s largest mall.  Opened in 2005, almost no one ever visits it, and only around 1% of the retail space has been leased -- it just sits empty.  A lot of money went into building it, but no one needs or uses it.[2]&lt;p&gt;* A well-known hedge fund manager recently reported that China is building &quot;2.8 billion square metres of Class A office space over the following couple of years...  That’s basically a five-foot by five-foot office cubicle for every man, woman and child in China.” A lot of money is going into building &lt;i&gt;a new cubicle for everyone&lt;/i&gt;, but what&apos;s the economic rationale?[3]&lt;p&gt;[1] Here&apos;s a recent BBC article on it: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17390729&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17390729&lt;/a&gt; and a great photo essay in Time: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1975397,00.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1975397,00.htm...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[2] Here&apos;s a recent video of the mall on a Saturday: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eel1r1nm1lU&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eel1r1nm1lU&lt;/a&gt; and here&apos;s an article about it: &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1223747/Ghost-mall-The-worlds-largest-loneliest-shopping-centre.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1223747/Ghost-mall-T...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[3] For example, see &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-magazine/chanos-calls-china-syndrome/article596067/?page=all&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-magazi...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>The Macroeconomics of Chinese kleptocracy</title><url>http://brontecapital.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/macroeconomics-of-chinese-kleptocracy.html</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>ridruejo</author><text>John Hempton (the author of the blog) is awesome, thought the crap he has to deal with is usually not. I find his accounts fascinating, kind of an Australian Michael Lewis mini-me. You can take a look at another post from him of a couple of years ago taking a look at Linux/Windows/Apple  &lt;a href=&quot;http://brontecapital.blogspot.com.es/2010/08/fund-manager-experiments-in-geek.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://brontecapital.blogspot.com.es/2010/08/fund-manager-ex...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>