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Bonds, Stocks, Economy: How China’s Property Woes Are Spilling Overseas

Marco Metzler of Switzerland gets 2,000 new followers a day on LinkedIn, all watching to see what will happen to his money. Metzler invested $50,000 last month in the offshore bonds of real estate developer China Evergrande Group to see if he would get any returns. The former Fitch Ratings analyst is not expecting much. He’s out to prove a point about China’s troubled property sector by chronicling the fate of his investment on social media.

“I was concerned about what was going on, and from my past I’m able to read rating reports and also to see what’s going on in the world in economics, and I felt obligated to speak out to the world and to warn about that situation,” Metzler told VOA. “We didn’t invest to get the money back, so I’m fully aware this will be lost.”

Evergrande has struggled since last year, when the Chinese government began clamping down on the country’s property sector to rein in excessive debt and cap speculation.

Towering apartment blocks today extend far into the suburbs of major Chinese cities, but many flats are unoccupied, owned instead by absentee speculators and their banks. Evergrande Group, one of China’s biggest property developers by revenue, is now selling assets and may be staring down a massive restructuring to ease debt.

Companies or governments that invest in offshore bonds, and individuals who trade stocks listed outside mainland China and its $15.42 trillion economy, are coming to terms — albeit more quietly than Metzler — with the Chinese property crisis of 2021. These troubles are threatening bond returns, lowering some stock prices and could erode at least a quarter of the world’s second largest economy.

“I don’t think anyone debates the importance of the real estate market on the Chinese economy,” said James Macdonald, head of the property services firm Savills Research in Shanghai, who estimates real estate at 25% to 30% of China’s economy.

“If we do see a significant slowdown in the real estate market, it will have an impact in terms of domestic economic growth rates, and that could have a knock-on effect in terms of global economy,” Macdonald said.

As many analysts have noted, any major economic shocks that hit China, a country closely tied to the global manufacturing supply chain, and whose massive consumer base importers and exporters rely on, are inevitably felt around the world.

Property crisis: Evergrande and beyond

Evergrande is a bellwether firm that is more than $300 billion in debt. Hong Kong-listed shares in Evergrande have tumbled since February, though the developer averted default in October by paying interest on an overseas bond.

Another Chinese development giant, Kaisa Group Holdings, faces limited funding access and uncertainty over refinancing a “significant amount” of U.S.-dollar bond payments into next year “in light of ongoing capital-market volatility,” Fitch said in an e-mailed news release last month.

Smaller property developers are likely to rattle bond markets outside China because they are “less sound” than bigger ones, said Lillian Li, a vice president-senior credit officer at the Moody’s ratings service.

“We see that the offshore bond market has actually shown larger volatility than the domestic market in front of these regulatory crackdowns, including in the property sector,” Li said.

The Hang Seng Properties Index in Hong Kong, where foreigners are allowed to trade shares of Chinese companies, has lost about 1.2% year to date.

Municipal officials in some cities capped home purchase prices in September to deter speculators, further hobbling property momentum in China. The domestic property market could shrink by half a percent in 2022, Li said. Last month, prices for new as well as resale homes fell amid a fall in construction starts.

What happens next

Evergrande has offered its investors cash payment by installments as well as putting forth actual structures as repayment assets, the state-run China Daily news website says.

Central government officials hope to contain property speculation and leave property for people to occupy, the official Xinhua News Agency reports.

About $52 billion in Chinese property bonds will mature next year and $44 billion the following year, said Henry Chin, Asia Pacific research head with the real estate services firm CBRE. Other bond issuers will default, he forecasts.

No offshore investors want the bonds now, said Liang Kuo-yuan, president of the Taipei-based Yuanta-Polaris Research Institute, though he believes Taiwanese insurers and pension funds have invested in the past.

“Taiwan’s insurers more or less will buy high-yield and high-risk investment products, because the interest rates on policies they’ve sold in the past are too high,” Liang said.

Evergrande was once seen as the epitome of a Chinese property mainland market, Liang added. China’s real estate sector, the world’s largest, grew briskly from 2010 to 2018, says investment bank J.P. Morgan.

But not all is lost, some analysts say.

Investors in private equity for distressed debt could get a lift from China’s property spillover if companies look for new ways to repay debt, said Chin of CBRE. Some stock-buying vehicles have made money, too. Shares of the TAO-Invesco China Real Estate exchange-traded fund of Chinese stocks including Evergrande, for example, has grown 65% year to date.

But back in Switzerland, Metzler wrote on LinkedIn that Evergrande had “officially defaulted on overdue interest payments” and that his current company, DMSA, would file a bankruptcy case against the group. He calls China’s property market “a first domino” in a broader financial and economic crisis.

“The old system needs to come down before a new system will be established,” he told VOA.

Source: Voice of America

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White House: 10% of Kids Have Been Vaccinated in First 2 Weeks

The White House says about 10% of eligible kids aged 5 to 11 have received a dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine since its approval for their age group two weeks ago.

At least 2.6 million kids have received a shot, White House COVID-19 coordinator Jeff Zients said Wednesday, with 1.7 million doses administered in the last week alone, roughly double the pace of the first week after approval. It’s more than three times faster than the rate adults were vaccinated at the start of the nation’s vaccination campaign 11 months ago.

Zients said there are now 30,000 locations across the country for kids to get a shot, up from 20,000 last week, and that the administration expects the pace of pediatric shots to pick up in the coming days.

Kids who get their first vaccine dose by the end of this week will be fully vaccinated by Christmas, assuming they get their second shot three weeks after the first one.

Pace varies among states

State-by-state breakdowns of doses given to the age group haven’t been released by the White House or the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but figures shared by states show the pace varies. About 11% to 12% of children in that age group have received their first doses in Colorado, Utah and Illinois, but the pace is much slower in places like Idaho (5%), Tennessee (5%) and Wyoming (4%), three states that have some of the lowest rates of vaccination for older groups.

The White House was stepping up its efforts to promote kid vaccination, with first lady Jill Biden and the singer Ciara taping a video Wednesday encouraging shots for kids.

The first lady also visited a Washington pediatric care facility along with Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy, the Washington Mystics’ Alysha Clark and the Washington Wizards’ Thomas Bryant.

“You’re the real heroes,” Biden told newly vaccinated kids. “You have your superpower and now you’re protected against COVID.”

Biden also warned parents against misinformation around the vaccines and emphasized their safety.

“I want you to remember and share with other parents: The vaccine protects your children against COVID-19,” she said. “It’s been thoroughly reviewed and rigorously tested. It’s safe. It’s free, and it’s available for every single child in this country 5 and up.”

Source: Voice of America

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Overdose Deaths in US Top 100,000, CDC Says

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention projects that 100,000 Americans died of drug overdose between May 2020 and April 2021 — a nearly 30% increase over the previous year.

While not an official count, the CDC says it can confirm 98,000 deaths so far during the period and estimates the total number will likely be around 100,300 after causes of death are made official. It can take months to investigate and finalize drug fatalities.

Experts say the increased availability of the deadly opioids, particularly fentanyl, is a major driver, accounting for 64% of overdose deaths.

Another factor is the COVID-19 pandemic which made it hard for drug users to get treatment or support.

“What we’re seeing are the effects of these patterns of crisis and the appearance of more dangerous drugs at much lower prices,” Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, told CNN. “In a crisis of this magnitude, those already taking drugs may take higher amounts and those in recovery may relapse. It’s a phenomenon we’ve seen and perhaps could have predicted.”

In a statement, President Joe Biden called the number a “tragic milestone,” and said his administration “is committed to doing everything in our power to address addiction and end the overdose epidemic.”

Overdose deaths are now more common than deaths from car crashes, guns and the flu. Heart disease is the number one cause of death in the U.S., killing 660,000 in 2019.

Source: Voice of America

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For Millions in Brazil, Rising Poverty and Fuel Prices Mean a Return to the Past

María Ribeiro da Silva, 64, spent a hot afternoon hawking a new contraption to acquaintances and friends who passed by her small grocery store on the outskirts of São Paulo, Brazil’s largest city and home to more than 12 million people.

Everyone who passed by received the same invitation from her: “Come, come and see my stove. It’s beautiful. I made it.”

Each guest received the same explanation: “I built a real wood fire oven, with a chimney and everything. No more smoke, no more heat.”

It had been almost 50 years since Ribeiro da Silva cooked with firewood. Since she arrived in São Paulo in 1974, fleeing drought, hunger and poverty in the impoverished northeast region of Brazil, she has only cooked with gas.

“I spent my childhood using firewood. We didn’t have gas. We didn’t have the money to have a real stove. But since I arrived in Sao Paulo … wood was in the past,” she told VOA.

But with the Brazilian economy worsening, and the devastating effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the poorest parts of the population, firewood has become the only option for millions of families like Ribeiro da Silvas’.

It was a slow and gradual process for Ribeiro da Silva. First, firewood was only used in extreme cases when the gas ran out and there was not enough money to replace it. But when she lost her job as a cleaner at a company in downtown São Paulo six months ago, firewood became the primary fuel to cook food.

“Now, I only use the gas stove for simple things like making coffee or heating the food I cooked on firewood. I don’t have any more money to buy gas. The price is too high. It’s impossible,” she said.

Skyrocketing fuel prices

According to data from the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics, at least 25% of the Brazilian population is using wood as their primary cooking source.

This was before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Due to the pandemic, the Brazilian Statistical Institute stopped carrying out quarterly in-person surveys, so we don’t have data for 2020 and 2021,” said Adriana Gioda, a professor in the department of chemistry at Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro and a leading researcher on firewood consumption by Brazilian families.

“But since 2016, when the federal government cut subsidies for residential gas and tied the fuel price policy to the international prices, there has been a steady growth in the use of firewood to make food,” she told VOA.

Fuel prices have been rising steadily over the past five years but have skyrocketed since President Jair Bolsonaro took office in 2019. He promised not to interfere with the country’s state oil company and allow fuel prices to follow the international market.

This year alone, the price of residential gas rose by an average of 35%. Liquefied petroleum gas is the primary fuel for food production in Brazil, and its cost is linked directly to the price of the oil barrels.

‘Back in time’

“In the interior of Brazil, in rural and more isolated areas, using firewood is a tradition. But what impressed us most is that the use of wood is advancing precisely in the most urban areas, in large Brazilian cities, such as Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo,” Gioda said.

And it is rising in areas such as Jardim Marajoara, a poor neighborhood of migrants from the northeast region of Brazil on Sao Paulo’s outskirts, where Ribeiro da Silva lives. It is in these regions that the poorest and those most affected by the economic crisis are concentrated.

Juarez Viana, a bus driver who also lost his job during the pandemic, has turned to firewood to cook. He, like Ribeiro da Silva, lives in a suburb of São Paulo that is sprawling into the last green areas of the city. Once a week, he crosses the street and enters a small forest to fetch wood.

“It’s hard work, and it seems like I’ve gone back in time,” said Viana, who is also a migrant from the Brazilian northeast. At 49, he remembers cooking with wood as a child. “But it’s worth it. We do not have more money to buy gas. The price is out of control. I’ve never seen anything like this.”

“We are going back in time, going back at least half a century,” said pulmonologist Elie Fiss, a research director at Hospital Alemão Oswaldo Cruz. “Since the 1960s, we no longer saw respiratory problems related to the use of firewood for cooking. But with so many people going back to the firewood, this is a problem that will soon return to hospitals.”

Source: Voice of America

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Yellen Extends Date for Potential Debt Default to December 15

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen told Congress Tuesday that she believed she would run out of maneuvering room to avoid the nation’s first-ever default soon after December 15.

In a letter to congressional leaders, Yellen said that she believed Treasury could be left with insufficient resources to keep financing the government beyond December 15.

Yellen’s new date is 12 days later than the December 3 date she provided in a letter to Congress on October 18, after Congress had just passed a $480 billion increase in the debt limit days before as a stopgap measure.

As she has done in the past, Yellen urged Congress to deal with the debt limit quickly to remove the possibility of a potential default on the nation’s obligations.

“To ensure the full faith and credit of the United States, it is critical that Congress raise or suspend the debt limit as soon as possible,” Yellen wrote to congressional leaders.

Yellen has repeatedly warned that failure to deal with the debt limit and allowing the government to default would be catastrophic and likely push the country into a recession.

In her letter, Yellen said that the extra time reflected more up-to-date estimates of government revenues and spending and was impacted by the infrastructure bill that President Joe Biden signed into law Monday. That legislation requires the transfer by Treasury of $118 billion by December 15 into the Highway Trust Fund.

Yellen said that while she had a “high degree of confidence she will be able to finance the U.S. government through Dec. 15” and complete the Highway Trust Fund transfer, there are scenarios where the government will be left with insufficient resources to finance operations beyond that date, she said.

The need to raise or suspend the debt limit is just one of the budget issues facing Congress. Lawmakers must also approve a budget by December 3, when the current stopgap funding measures run out. Failure to do that would trigger a government shutdown.

And Democrats are aiming to approve a $1.75 trillion measure to expand the social safety net and deal with climate change threats. Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said she hopes the House can pass this measure, which Republicans oppose, this week. It must also pass the Senate.

Source: Voice of America

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Russia Rejects Accusations Its Space Weapons Test Endangers ISS Astronauts

Russian officials on Tuesday rejected accusations that they endangered astronauts aboard the International Space Station by conducting a weapons test that created more than 1,500 pieces of space junk.

U.S. officials on Monday accused Russia of destroying an old satellite with a missile in what they called a reckless and irresponsible strike. The debris could do major damage to the space station as it is orbiting at 28,000 kph (17,500 mph).

Astronauts now face four times greater risk than normal, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson told The Associated Press.

The test clearly demonstrates that Russia, “despite its claims of opposing the weaponization of outer space, is willing to … imperil the exploration and use of outer space by all nations through its reckless and irresponsible behavior,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement.

The Russian space agency Roscosmos wouldn’t confirm or deny that the strike took place, saying only that “unconditional safety of the crew has been and remains our main priority” in a vague online statement released Tuesday.

Russia’s Defense Ministry on Tuesday confirmed carrying out a test and destroying a defunct satellite that has been in orbit since 1982, but insisted that “the U.S. knows for certain that the resulting fragments, in terms of test time and orbital parameters, did not and will not pose a threat to orbital stations, spacecraft and space activities” and called remarks by U.S. officials “hypocritical.”

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov also charged that it is “hypocrisy” to say that Russia creates risks for peaceful activities in space.

Once the situation became clear early Monday morning, the four Americans, one German and two Russians on board the International Space Station were ordered to immediately seek shelter in their docked capsules. They spent two hours in the two capsules, finally emerging only to have to close and reopen hatches to the station’s individual labs on every orbit, or 1 1/2 hours, as they passed near or through the debris.

NASA Mission Control said the heightened threat could continue to interrupt the astronauts’ science research and other work. Four of the seven crew members only arrived at the orbiting outpost Thursday night.

A similar weapons test by China in 2007 also resulted in countless pieces of debris. One of those threatened to come dangerously close to the space station last week. While it later was dismissed as a risk, NASA had the station move anyway.

Anti-satellite missile tests by the U.S. in 2008 and India in 2019 were conducted at much lower altitudes, well below the space station at about 260 miles (420 kilometers.)

Source: Voice of America