Depending on what market or macro indication you choose to believe in, China is doing terribly badly or is on a sustainable path to a more domestic consumption-based economy. This weekend's PMIs show the economy is barely limping higher but Industrial Output is dismally low; HSI is ripping higher while SHCOMP is at multi-year lows. What is more critical, as Bloomberg's Michael McDonough points out today [4], is China’s growing role as a transmission mechanism between the economies of the developing and developed world. China’s economic rise has been accompanied by a surge in its appetite for imports - especially raw materials - even as global demand has been slow to recover. This introduces new stresses for many export-oriented countries by reducing the diversity of their trade relationships as they become more and more dependent on China in particular, creating substantial risk for those economies, which account for an increasing share of global GDP. Russian, Brazilian and Indian trade volumes have become heavily dependent on China at 10.6 percent, 17.5 percent and 9 percent, respectively. An economic crisis in Brazil would have a minimal impact on the Chinese economy, while a slowdown in China would likely crush Brazil’s external sector and domestic economy.
[5]
Source: Bloomberg Briefs