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’Don’t worry, it’s normal for China’s GDP to appear a little weird
Still confused by China’s better than expected GDP numbers? (Especially given stories like this, and this, and this?)
You’re not the only ones.
Standard Chartered’s Stephen Green and Lan Shen, however,
Your new safe havens are in Japan
And that would be not for currency, but property and equities.
If the low yields of Treasuries and Bunds are becoming too tedious for words, take a look at this in the FT:
Industry officials say US investment funds managed by large groups including Blackstone and Fortress Investment,
The O’Lloyds zombie, in context
Not too surprising to see Lloyds’ effort at kitchen-sinking Irish exposures in its Q1 results, with impairments up £500m more than guided to £1.14bn…
Even so, it’s a nice test case of how bad Irish property loan losses could conceivably get,
More on Japan’s odd metamorphosis…
No, it wasn’t Wednesday’s earthquake, even though it prompted the normally staid fixed income commentators at RBS Securities Japan to end their daily Japanese government bond market note thus:
Northern Japan was hit by a 7.3-magnitude earthquake at lunch time.
Remember that other sovereign crisis?
It seems there’s been some further developments in the sorry saga of the Palm Island state on Thursday.
According to Reuters sources, Dubai Group — a unit of the Dubai Holdings conglomerate owned by Dubai,
StanChart: Chinese property correction imminent
Standard Chartered analysts have always proved themselves pretty exhaustive when it comes to assessing the Chinese property market.
So when they say they believe a correction in property prices is imminent,
What’s up with Spanish mortgage lending?
The non-performing pain in Spain is back in the limelight.
The total stock of non-performing loans sloshing around the Spanish banking system hit €100bn in May, according to data from the Bank of Spain released on Monday.
Henderson’s Hong Kong property dream falls through
Fresh from Hong Kong — a headache for property giant, Henderson Land.
Late on Tuesday, the company controlled by billionaire Lee Shau-kee let slip that it would take an HK$734m charge (USD$94m) on 20 cancelled Hong Kong apartment sales.
Unstable structure, do not enter
That warning comes from Nomura’s Mike Prew who thinks property stocks, or real estate investment trusts (REITs), are at risk from a second wave of rights and possibly dividend cuts.
The highly regarded analyst (and property bear) reckons the accounting presentation of REITs must be re-examined because revenues are being flattered by a string of one-offs and other curiosities:
Chinese property developers begin price war
Hat tip to the FT’s Jamie Chisholm for directing our gaze over to Thursday’s sizeable 4 per cent market slide in Shanghai:
All of which is supposedly linked to jitters emanating from this Shanghai Securities News story,
The China property splurge, up close and personal
Shimao is the Chinese property developer controlled by the country’s enigmatic billionaire, Xu Rongmao.
Readers in the UK might be familiar with Rongmao, since he was linked back in September 2008 to the possible purchase of Mike Ashley’s stake in Newcastle United Football Club.
Wen, will property cool?
Amid the flurry of media attempts to parse the assurances of elusive Chinese mandarins, one announcement on Monday from the housing ministry looked like it might actually tell us something about the direction of Chinese economic reform.
UK housing drop: was it the weather?
More UK housing data just in and it leaves us wondering — was it the weather?
House prices as tracked by the Halifax fell 1.5 per cent for the month of February, putting an end to seven consecutive months of house price rises.
Falling UK house prices – the next big thing?
A surprise drop in UK house prices in February – the first decline in 10 months – has left us asking a familiar question.
Was it just the bad weather or is this the start of a new trend?
From Nationwide,
BBVA, an exercise in Spanish banking losses
Remember BBVA?
The Spanish bank surprised markets last week with an earnings miss, causing its shares to fall about 6 per cent on the day.
In addition to revaluing some of its US business, the bank also “reassessed”
The ultimate in Jingle Mail
Jingle Mail : A situation where a homeowner mails his or her house keys to a mortgage lender due to an inability to meet mortgage payment obligations and a lack of equity in the property. If a homeowner is upside-down in a mortgage and feels the entire loan is a lost cause,
Some CMBS datapoints
Titan Europe 2006-3 — part of a CMBS deal put together by Credit Suisse — has been mentioned on FT Alphaville before.
The deal pooled commercial properties in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg,
Sterling, Dubai: a liquidation love story
In case you were wondering why sterling might be suffering on the back of the Dubai story, Reuters reports on Thursday:
LONDON, Nov 26 (Reuters) – The Dubai government could be forced to hold a firesale of its international real estate if creditors to two of its flagship companies reject proposals to put near-term debt obligations on ice until May 2010.
China is ‘the most obvious area of concern’, Fitch says
Here’s something you may have missed — not least because it comes from a Reuters chat room.
Regardless, the comments from James McCormack, managing director of Asia Pacific sovereign ratings at ratings agency Fitch,
China’s land boom goes private
How does one compete with a liquidity-swamped state-owned Chinese land developer?
Like so:
HONG KONG (Dow Jones)–Chinese developer Agile Property Holdings Ltd. (3383.HK) plans to sell US$400 million worth of seven-year U.S.
That carpe diem (property) rally
JP Morgan property analysts Harm Meijer and Osmaan Malik give good notes, and their latest piece of research is no exception.
The two are now even more convinced that UK property values are recovering,
Presenting the segmented commercial real estate crash
Lo and behold — the commercial real estate market crash in nuanced detail.
FT Alphaville journeyed to the offices of CB Richard Ellis, the CRE specialist and special servicer to the CMBS stars, on your behalf,
UK property, building castles in the sand
How often do you see a research report on UK property kicked off by a Jimi Hendrix quote?
The third edition of JP Morgan’s annual European Property Handbook came out earlier this week, and it makes for poetic,
Lex: UK house prices
Positive signs from the UK housing market do not translate into a recovery.
It would be remarkable if the British housing market really had stabilised, given that the economy is some six months into the steepest recession experienced since World War II.
UK house sales rise as market improves
Inquiries by would-be homebuyers at estate agents are translating more frequently into purchases, according to figures published on Tuesday. Newly agreed sales are rising more widely across the market than at any point since data were first collected in 1999,
Iraqi datapoint du jour
Basra is booming!
And not in the same way it was six months ago, when the booms were generally of the high-explosive variety.
So says Major General Barney White-Spunner:
Property prices have more than doubled since March.
Property pundits’ debate signals change
Property is the new weather: it seems just as unpredictable, and Brits feel able to discuss it with complete strangers.
Take December house prices, for example. Halifax says they went up; Rightmove says they went down.