China Has Ground To A Halt: “On The Ground” Indicators Confirm Worst-Case Scenario
Back on Monday, when analysts and investors were desperately seeking clues whether China has managed to reboot its economy from the 2-week long hiatus following the Lunar New Year/Coronavirus pandemic amid the information blackout unleashed by the communist party in the already opaque country, we pointed out some alternative ways to keep tabs of what is really taking place “on the ground” in China, where Xi Jinping has been urging local businesses and workers to reopen and resume output, while ignoring the risk the viral pandemic poses to them (with potentially catastrophic consequences).
Specifically, Morgan Stanley suggested that real time measurements of Chinese pollution levels would provide a “quick and dirty” (no pun intended) way of observing if any of China’s major metropolises had returned back to normal. What it found was that among some of the top Chinese cities including Guangzhou, Shanghai and Chengdu, a clear pattern was evident – air pollution was only 20-50% of the historical average. As Morgan Stanley concluded, “This could imply that human activities such as traffic and industrial production within/close to those cities are running 50-80% below their potential capacity.”
北京时间2月13日今天下午1时左右，武汉市多地居民包括江夏、光谷、徐东、南湖、东西湖等地均听到巨响，微博网友说玻璃和地板都在抖动，巨响后一直有飞机飞过。 pic.twitter.com/Bs4fDvEMYC
— 關堯 · Alston Kwan (@Alston_Kwan) February 13, 2020
… virtually all of China – and all those critical supply chains that keep companies across the globe humming and stocked with critical inventory – remain on lockdown.
www.zerohedge.com/economics/chin…e-scenario