Chinese Stock Market Crash

[troutman]

I'm livin' on a Chinese stock
All my best things are in hock
I'm livin' on a Chinese stock
Everything is in the pawn shop

[GirlySports]

Damn, the reach of this Ashley Madison thing is more impressive than I could have imagined.

[Ozy_Flame]

Foreclosures coming on high-end Vancouver real estate perhaps?

[Resolute 14]

I'm rather bemused by all of this because I started a new TSFA mutual fund a couple months ago thinking that we'd bottomed out on oil and things should slowly recover. Luckily for me, this one is still small (only about $1500 in it) so the subsequent falls aren't hurting. Long haul...

[chemgear]

Originally Posted by Ozy_Flame

Foreclosures coming on high-end Vancouver real estate perhaps?

Naw, if anything "those foreigners" are going to pile even more money into something that's still inflating/being propped up by a bubble.

[GirlySports]

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

I'm rather bemused by all of this because I started a new TSFA mutual fund a couple months ago thinking that we'd bottomed out on oil and things should slowly recover. Luckily for me, this one is still small (only about $1500 in it) so the subsequent falls aren't hurting. Long haul...

I'm hurting a bit too but I invest monthly so on Sept 1 maybe I'll get a cheap rate!

[Slava]

I can't give specific advice here, but a couple things to bear in mind. First of all, the markets are volatile today, but we're talking about a 2% drop today at this point, despite the news articles that will surely sensationalize this.

The other and more important consideration is that if you are investing for the long term these shorter term issues are largely meaningless. I mean sure, if you bought at 7:31am this morning you got a better deal than what you got say right now, but 20-30 years down the road its not a huge deal. The idea of timing some events like this with long term investments is ridiculous. Be patient. If you don't want to see volatility then you have a couple options: don't invest in things with the potential to be volatile, or don't look.

[OMG!WTF!]

Apple is below $100 a barrel. I thought we were approaching peak Apple.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by OMG!WTF!

Apple is below $100 a barrel. I thought we were approaching peak Apple.

I'm not even sure how many shares constitute a barrel of Apple!

[username]

Originally Posted by Slava

If you don't want to see volatility then you have a couple options: don't invest in things with the potential to be volatile, or don't look.

Problem is, it's like a car crash - it's impossible not to look!

[Resolute 14]

Originally Posted by Slava

I can't give specific advice here, but a couple things to bear in mind. First of all, the markets are volatile today, but we're talking about a 2% drop today at this point, despite the news articles that will surely sensationalize this.

The other and more important consideration is that if you are investing for the long term these shorter term issues are largely meaningless. I mean sure, if you bought at 7:31am this morning you got a better deal than what you got say right now, but 20-30 years down the road its not a huge deal. The idea of timing some events like this with long term investments is ridiculous. Be patient. If you don't want to see volatility then you have a couple options: don't invest in things with the potential to be volatile, or don't look.

Haha, no doubt. As I said, I'm bemused more than anything, and only because of my timing. In 20-30 years when I cash it in, this drop will be a long forgotten blip. But I am enjoying following it because the little rises and bigger falls really lays bare the challenges the market is having at this point in time. This fund has lost about 5% since I started it - but that equates to only a $70 loss for me right now. And the flip side is it means my automatic deposits are currently buying more shares than when I started, which will help in the long run.

[darklord700]

Originally Posted by Ozy_Flame

Foreclosures coming on high-end Vancouver real estate perhaps?

I've heard because loonie tanked last year, a lot of the Chinese buyers are losing their shirts on Canadian properties if they bought in last few years when the loonie was high.

[peter12]

Originally Posted by darklord700

I've heard because loonie tanked last year, a lot of the Chinese buyers are losing their shirts on Canadian properties if they bought in last few years when the loonie was high.

Most of me says "good."

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by Ozy_Flame

Foreclosures coming on high-end Vancouver real estate perhaps?

Originally Posted by chemgear

Naw, if anything "those foreigners" are going to pile even more money into something that's still inflating/being propped up by a bubble.

Originally Posted by darklord700

I've heard because loonie tanked last year, a lot of the Chinese buyers are losing their shirts on Canadian properties if they bought in last few years when the loonie was high.

Originally Posted by peter12

Most of me says "good."

Sometimes I wonder how these things impact foreign markets:

Documents obtained under access to information law — and The Province’s interviews with a wide array of B.C. real estate professionals, money laundering experts and Fintrac officials — suggest dramatic under-reporting of large cash transactions and suspicious transactions that realtors and developers are responsible to make to the federal government.

“We have significantly increased our examinations in the Vancouver area,” a Fintrac official said. “Our compliance people are not happy.”

The Vancouver audit comes in the context of Fintrac documents that state Canada’s real estate sector is seen as “higher risk” for money laundering than all other sectors — such as banks, casinos, and money wiring services — that are required to report to Fintrac to combat money laundering.

These professionals must file reports for cash transactions over $10,000, and more importantly from Fintrac’s perspective, suspicious transactions.

Fintrac contracted Toronto accounting firm Grant Thornton to investigate all reporting sectors in 2014, but asked the firm to prioritize the real estate sector. Specific money laundering risks in Canadian real estate, according to the independent report obtained by The Province, include buyer concealment loopholes involving lawyers and legal trust funds, a “high number of cash transactions” and a lack of “quality or ethics infrastructure,” and “disengagement” with compliance rules.

“The purchase of Canadian real estate assets with offshore money and or by offshore persons was noted as a significant risk factor,” the report said.

Despite these alleged risks, data obtained by The Province shows that from January 2012 through May 2015 only two large cash transaction reports and five suspicious transaction reports were filed by realtors to Fintrac in the surging Vancouver, Richmond, West Vancouver and North Vancouver property markets.

In comparison, in that time period financial institutions in Vancouver reported 1,278,804 large cash transactions, and 8,246 suspicious transactions, according to Fintrac data. Fintrac is satisfied with reporting compliance from financial institutions, an official said. However, internal Fintrac documents say that banks are erring by not scrutinizing real estate as a high-risk money-laundering sector.

A previous investigation by The Province showed Vancouver’s airport leads North America by a wide margin in the millions of undeclared cash seized from Chinese citizens.

Canadian Border Services data showed that between June 2012 and December 2014 about $10 million in undeclared cash was discovered and then returned to Chinese citizens at YVR.

Experts told The Province those figures represent a fraction of the illicit money from China believed to be pouring into B.C. to be laundered in real estate, in the wake of an aggressive Chinese Communist Party anti-corruption campaign.

The same experts have told The Province that the two large cash transactions reported by Vancouver-area realtors do not add up with anecdotal reports of large cash buys taking place.

http://www.theprovince.com/business/...753/story.html

[nik-]

They're relying on realtors to report the large cash purchases funding their commissions?

[peter12]

Oh yes, this audit will have results that were a long time coming. Vancouver was a dump for illegally obtained offshore profits, and the real estate industry basically played the role of the bag man for years.

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by nik-

They're relying on realtors to report the large cash purchases funding their commissions?

We have a top-notch system at work here in BC.

We don't even keep records of foreign real-estate investment.

[nik-]

I wonder if the Russians have started doing in it Vancouver too like they have been in Spain and London.

[blankall]

Originally Posted by chemgear

Naw, if anything "those foreigners" are going to pile even more money into something that's still inflating/being propped up by a bubble.

And the foreign investors largely pay in cash without mortgages. So there's nothing to foreclose on.

[heep223]

Originally Posted by username

Yikes.....might be time to move into gold.....

Gold is down 20% since the energy collapse. Commodities, including precious metals, look extremely weak. How would buying gold help you?