Subscribe

Log-in

E psilon T heory ET I ntro ET O rigins I nflation R accoons C alled I t

L ife & C areer A dvice

The Most Important Sector in the Universe

August 2, 2022 | Marc Rubinstein | No Comments | In Brief

Marc Rubinstein has over 25 years experience as an analyst and investor in the financials sector which he distills into a
weekly newsletter, Net Interest, which I think is a really great read! Between 2006 and 2016 he was senior analyst and
portfolio manager on the Lansdowne Global Financials Fund, a fundamental long/short equity fund focused exclusively on
the global financials sector. Prior to that, Marc was an Institutional Investor ranked analyst on the sell-side, most recently at
Credit Suisse, where he was a managing director overseeing its European banks team. As well as writing Net Interest, Marc
is an active angel investor in fintech. He can be contacted via his newsletter or on Twitter (@MarcRuby).

As with all of our guest contributors, Marc’s post may not represent the views of Epsilon Theory or Second Foundation
Partners, and should not be construed as advice to purchase or sell any security.

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
 Manage consent

It’s been described as “the most important sector in the universe” and it’s easy to see why. The Chinese property sector is first
and foremost big. The total value of all the homes in China stands at $60 trillion – twice the size of the US residential market
and bigger even than the entire US bond market. The Chinese property market is probably the largest asset class globally.

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
 Manage consent

(source: WFE, CEIC, Japan Cabinet Office, Halifax, Goldman Sachs Global Investment Research)

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
 It’s also central to the economy. Real estate investment stood at over 13% of GDP in 2019, of which more than 70%Manage consent
was linked
to residential building. Add in the contribution of the construction industry and the share jumps closer to 29%. Yet even this
potentially understates the importance of property to the economy: Housing accounts for almost two-thirds of households’
overall assets – compared with around a third in Japan and a quarter in the US – so it has a major bearing on people’s
spending decisions. [1]

It’s central to government finances, too. Since changing its constitution to allow land-use rights to be bought and sold under
long term leases, the Chinese state has relied on land sales to raise funds to meet its budget. Based on data from the IMF,
revenues from land sales accounted for around 39% of local government revenues, equivalent to 7% of GDP, in 2017.

And it’s central to the financial system. Banks rely on real estate and land holdings as the main source of collateral to secure
loans. Housing loans account for around a third of banks’ loan books and have grown more quickly than other loan
categories. In the four years through to 2018, the average annual increase in real estate credit was 20%, versus 6% in
manufacturing.

So when the biggest star in the most important sector in the universe burns out, you’d think it would have ramifications. That
star is Evergrande, which we discussed here a year ago. One of the largest property developers in China, it found itself on
the wrong side of three “red lines” that Chinese authorities had drawn to curb leverage in the sector. Having grown
aggressively using borrowed funds, it buckled under the new guidelines and creditors began to take fright. 

Behind the scenes, policymakers mobilised to gauge the fallout. In June 2021, China’s financial regulator instructed banks to
conduct a stress test around an Evergrande failure. The conclusion was plainly that banks could handle it. In December,
China’s central bank governor ruled out a state-sanctioned bailout, proclaiming that the situation would need to be dealt
with by the market: Evergrande was on its own. Later that month, the company skipped payments on coupons due on US
Dollar denominated debt and credit rating agencies officially categorised it in default.

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
 Manage consent

Evergrande bond price (source: Bloomberg)

Since then, Evergrande has been working on a restructuring, but with its bonds trading at eight cents on the dollar, creditors
don’t harbour much hope of recovery. This week, the company’s CEO and CFO both resigned amidst an investigation into
how $2 billion of deposits were used as security for third parties to obtain bank loans, which some borrowers then failed to
pay back. Before they departed, they had promised to release a preliminary restructuring plan by the end of July and today,
the company provided some
x rough details with a full plan to come later in the year. 
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
 Against the backdrop of a slowing real estate market, other developers got squeezed, too. In the first half of 2022,Manage consent
property
sales dropped by 29%, land sales plummeted by 50%, and average home selling prices fell by 5%. New home prices have
now slid for 10 consecutive months and sales have fallen for 12 straight months, the longest slump since China created a
private property market in the late 1990s. 

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
 Manage consent
Monthly change in China 70-city home price index

Evergrande may have been the largest, but it wasn’t the only property developer to default on debt. Since the beginning of
last year, 35 property companies have skipped bond payments. Shanghai-based Shimao Group is one of the latest to be
added to the list, having failed to pay off a $1 billion offshore bond earlier this month. Currently, around three-quarters of
Chinese property high yield bonds are priced below 35 cents on the dollar, signalling significant stress.

Initially, the financial regulator’s analysis that the banking sector could be sheltered from the real estate stress proved
correct. Most defaults were restricted to developers’ offshore debt; even Evergrande has remained current on its onshore
debt (for now). Bank loans to property developers are typically well collateralised, and their direct exposure to developers is
in any case not that high – only around 6% of average loans among the larger banks. 

So for a while, banks chugged along. Evergrande newsflow peaked in September and then the world forgot about it. Crisis
averted. 

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
 Manage consent

Shares of newspaper articles mentioning Evergrande of total articles published on China in the Wall
Street Journal and the South China Morning Post. (source: ECB)

But then, people stopped paying their mortgages. In late June, around 900 residents in the southeastern province of Jiangxi
stopped making repayments on loans they had taken to finance Evergrande apartments whose completion had stalled.
Within weeks, the boycott spread to at least 300 equally unfinished projects across more than 90 cities. [2]

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
 Manage consent
The issue is that traditional credit, be it from banks or bond markets, represents only a part of Chinese property companies’
funding. In addition, developers raise funds through pre-sales. Purchasers make down payments into a developer’s escrow
account some 18-24 months before taking delivery of their home which are then topped up via mortgage loans. These
funds would normally be sufficient to cover the remaining cost of construction of the project, but developers have a history
of mismanaging them. When the market was strong, it didn’t matter – incoming funds from new pre-sales compensated for
the misallocation of historic funds. But when the market turned – and traditional credit channels turned off their supply of
new credit – many developers ran out of funds to complete projects. Instead of using escrow funds to build homes, many
raided them to meet other liquidity needs. 

*Property developer loans, trust credit, on- and offshore bonds.

**Based on primary market sales ratio in 23 cities and includes housing provident fund loans.

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
(source: CEIC, Wind, Autonomous Research)
 Manage
Sounds a bit like a Ponzi scheme? As liquidity has retrenched the world over, schemes sustained by steady inflows of cashconsent
have begun to falter. That’s been the case across the crypto ecosystem and it’s been the case in venture too, as we
discussed two weeks ago in The Great Unwind. Chinese real estate is another, larger example where the ripple effects are
now being felt. 

It’s no wonder borrowers are refusing to pay. As well as paying rent or covering the cost of finance on their existing home,
they are paying a mortgage on a new home they are unsure when they will get possession of, if at all. Unfinished residential
projects across China represent only 1.7% of total outstanding mortgage loans so it’s not a huge exposure for the banks, but it
is a lot riskier than they anticipated: The loans are guaranteed by property developers, so what looked money-good in 2019
and 2020 looks decidedly less so now. 

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
 Manage consent

To stave off the crisis, authorities are reportedly putting together a national fund of up to RMB 300 billion to help complete
unfinished projects. Just as the Federal Reserve keeps one eye on the stock market as a gauge of conditions it helps
maintain, and the European Central Bank looks at peripheral bond spreads, Chinese authorities look at home prices.
President Xi stresses that houses “are for living in, not for speculation,” but they nevertheless represent a significant
proportion of household wealth and any damage has wide implications. Attention is particularly focused right now, in the run
up to the China Party Congress later in the year.

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
 Manage consent

(source: NIFD, CEIC, Wind, Japan Cabinet Office, Halifax, Goldman Sachs Global Investment Research)

For years, people have been waiting for the Chinese financial system to implode. In 2015, hedge fund manager Kyle Bass,
x
0 POSTS REMAINING
who had
SUBSCRIBE
been early to the troubles
| LOGIN
system in its
of the US financial system in 2006, wrote to his investors: “Similar to the US banking
approach to the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), China’s banking system has increasingly pursued excessive
 Manage
leverage, regulatory arbitrage, and irresponsible risk taking. Banking system losses – which could exceed 400 percent consent
of the
US banking losses incurred during the subprime crisis – are starting to accelerate.”

Since then, we’ve seen several waves of negative profit growth but no significant erosion of book value. A government
bailout of unfinished homes would prevent such an erosion from occuring now. More generally, Chinese mortgage loans
have a number of features that mitigate their risk. One is the high rate of down payment that borrowers are required to make
– 30% for first time buyers and 80% for second-home buyers. Another is that, unlike in the US, banks are able to pursue a
borrower’s other assets if they default on their mortgage. So although boycotts are currently rife, ongoing strategic defaults
are less likely. Finally, rising home prices in the past (+68% between 2015 and 2018 in major cities) have created a sizable
buffer to cushion mortgage loans. 

In the US, property developer stress was the earliest sign of impending crisis: the sector peaked in 2005. The Chinese
banking system is better capitalised today than the US system was back then, and the state has more tools available to
contain losses. But it’s difficult to see how the most important sector in the universe can unwind without any collateral
damage elsewhere. It’s a slow process, but it’s one that needs watching.  

For more historical context on China financials, see my piece on Evergrande and my piece on the Chinese banking sector.

[1]Economists Kenneth Rogoff and Yuanchen Yang came up with the 29% estimate. It was subject to some criticism as too
high, but the economists defended it in an addendum to their original paper in December 2021.

[2]Prior to mid-July, crowdsourced online documents tracked boycotts across the country. But then they were censored.

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
To learn more about Epsilon Theory and be notified when we release new content sign up here. You’ll receive an email every
 p y g p y
Manage consent
week and your information will never be shared with anyone else.

Start the discussion at the Epsilon Theory Forum

The Latest From Epsilon Theory

DISCLOSURES
This commentary is being provided to you as general information only and should not be taken as investment advice. The opinions
expressed in these materials represent the personal views of the author(s). It is not investment research or a research
recommendation, as it does not constitute substantive research or analysis. Any action that you take as a result of information
contained in this document is ultimately your responsibility. Epsilon Theory will not accept liability for any loss or damage, including
without limitation to any loss of profit, which may arise directly or indirectly from use of or reliance on such information. Consult your
investment advisor before making any investment decisions. It must be noted, that no one can accurately predict the future of the
market with certainty or guarantee future investment performance. Past performance is not a guarantee of future results.
x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN
 Manage consent
Statements in this communication are forward-looking statements.
The forward-looking statements and other views expressed
herein are as of the date of this publication. Actual future results or occurrences may differ significantly from those anticipated in any
forward-looking statements, and there is no guarantee that any predictions will come to pass. The views expressed herein are
subject to change at any time, due to numerous market and other factors. Epsilon Theory disclaims any obligation to update publicly
or revise any forward-looking statements or views expressed herein.
This information is neither an offer to sell nor a solicitation of
any offer to buy any securities.
This commentary has been prepared without regard to the individual financial circumstances and
objectives of persons who receive it. Epsilon Theory recommends that investors independently evaluate particular investments and
strategies, and encourages investors to seek the advice of a financial advisor. The appropriateness of a particular investment or
strategy will depend on an investor’s individual circumstances and objectives.

© 2022 - Epsilon Theory Terms of Service Disclosures Privacy Policy Cookie policy (EU) Glossary

x
0 POSTS REMAINING
SUBSCRIBE | LOGIN