Uncertainty is growing over China’s ability to sustain the rapid rates of economic growth it has seen over the past decade
8:00PM GMT 16 Feb 2014
China’s “unfolding credit crunch” is having an unforeseen and dramatic impact on gold prices as investors urgently stock up on the precious metal as a form of financial protection against a sharp correction in the world’s second largest economy.
This is the main reason why gold prices have unexpectedly shot up more than 10pc to breach $1,300 (£776) an ounce for the first time since November against the prevailing forecasts for weaker demand made by many industry experts at the beginning of the year, according to Adrian Ash, head of research at gold trading platform BullionVault.com.
Gold traded on the Shanghai Gold Exchange has also reached a three-month high.
Rebounding is part of the reason for the rise, said Ash, adding: “Gold lost 30pc and silver nearly 40pc last year. The world economy will struggle to deliver all the good news priced in by that crash. But China’s unfolding credit-crunch looks central right now.”
Uncertainty is growing over China’s ability to sustain the rapid rates of economic growth it has seen over the past decade amid concern over high-levels of debt among its provincial governments. These concerns have helped to drive sharp falls across emerging markets since the beginning of the year.
Ash argues that capital flight is happening at a rapid rate in China because of the $1.8 trillion of funds that have flooded into unregulated, non-bank “wealth management products” which offered very high yields, up to 17 times as much as cash deposits. It is feared that many of these funds are now trading at a loss, setting up a crunch moment for China’s economy.
“Bullion traders never knew before what would happen to prices if China hit trouble,” said Ash, “because we’ve never before seen Chinese demand plumbed into the world market so deeply. Its jewellery buyers, together with rising mining costs worldwide, helped finally put a floor under gold in 2013. But while that kind of consumer demand will never drive prices higher, capital flight by wealthier households and Chinese money managers certainly can.”
According to Ash, the first default which could be a sign of China’s credit bubble bursting was reported two weeks ago when a $50m coal-mining bond failed to repay investors on maturity. He says that about $875bn of other such products are due to mature in 2014 and that Beijing has few answers available to tackle the problem.
“Gold’s 2014 rally had been steady before, far quieter than the rebound from last spring’s record crash,” he said. “But rising for seven of the past eight weeks, something it hasn’t managed in two years, gold has now risen for six trading days running. That’s a very rare move, last seen when gold neared its peak above $1900 during the euro crisis, US debt downgrade and UK riots of August 2011.”
Meanwhile, uncertainty continues to surround a 500-tonne discrepancy in China’s gold import figures and its domestic supply. The unaccounted-for Chinese gold has helped to fuel market speculation that the People’s Bank of China may be stockpiling, or that bigger volumes are changing hands on the grey market as a hedge against financial turmoil.
However, other brokers have said that the rise in gold prices last week above the commodity’s 200-day moving average was mainly because of the fall in the dollar against a basket of other currencies. Commerzbank said that SPDR Gold Trust, the world’s largest gold exchange-traded fund, raised its holdings above 800 tonnes of the precious metal for the first time.
According to Gold Money, bulls also returned to the market after Janet Yellen signalled that the US Federal Reserve will continue to prune back its stimulus measures. “Western buyers and vaults are now back in the frame amid the more bullish market sentiment,” said Roland Khounlivong, head of dealing for the broker.
