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China Liquidity Tightening A Risk To Global Assets

GLOBAL MARKET/OPINION

Since the start of the year, Chinese liquidity has been tightening (based on either the credit impulse, fiscal expansion or TSF). China Total Social Financing (TSF), a broader measure of China credit and liquidity, has been contracting sharply in the past 6 months, with the annual change in the 12M sum down from 10tr CNY in the end of 2020 to 3tr CNY in April 2021.

  • In the past cycle, TSF has shown strong co-movements with risk-on assets such as copper or the Australian dollar.
  • Tightening policy could eventually weigh on global equities in the coming months. Evidence shows that the China Credit Impulse has served as a good 6M leading liquidity indicator of global equities in the past cycle (MSCI world).


  • The China excess liquidity measure, which we proxy with the difference between real money growth and industrial production, has also been falling sharply in recent months amid rising inflationary pressures (PPI rose to 6.8% in April, highest level since Oct 2017).
  • Excess liquidity has also been a strong leading indicator for domestic risky assets but also international asset prices. Figure 4 shows the strong relationship between excess liquidity (6M Lead) and the Australian housing market since 2003 (and to a lesser extent the London housing market).
  • As a reminder, with China PPI rising to 6.8% YoY, China currently offers the lowest 10Y real yield among the EM world.
  • As this stage, the tightening of liquidity has impacted domestic internal assets, with Chinese equities down 15% since Mid February and China tech down over 30%.

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