Property sector leverage, China’s CPTPP bid

Evergrande is the poster child for the excesses of China’s property sector, and its short-term liabilities are particularly high. But the sector is full of similarly-leveraged peers. Indeed, nearly all of the huge expansion in the leverage of listed Chinese firms since the Global Financial Crisis was driven by property developers. Meanwhile, Australia’s new security pact with the US and UK underlines how unlikely it is that China’s bid this week to join the CPTPP will succeed.