Evergrande and China's property woes
Business Daily
BBC
4.4 • 816 Ratings
🗓️ 30 September 2021
⏱️ 17 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
China's second largest property developer, Evergrande, is at risk of financial collapse, saddled with billions of dollars of debt. It's already defaulted on some bond repayments and has been forced to sell off assets; both Chinese and international investors are worried and Beijing is weighing the risk of spreading contagion. The BBC's Stephen McDonnell tells us about the property boom in China while Sara Hsu, a Visiting Scholar at Fudan University, tells us that the sheer size of the company is a worry. China watcher George Magnus, Research associate at Oxford University's China Centre, and at SOAS appraises the wider ramifications of the Chinese property bubble being deflated for both China and the rest of the world. (Image: Evergrande's HQ; Image credit: Reuters)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello there, I'm Ed Butler. |
| 0:03.5 | Welcome to Business Daily from the BBC. |
| 0:06.3 | Today, the sound of scores of Chinese apartment blocks getting demolished, |
| 0:11.3 | or is that the crash of the whole real estate sector? |
| 0:19.7 | Yes, China's second largest property developer is at risk of financial collapse, we understand, |
| 0:26.3 | and Beijing is weighing the risk of spreading contagion. |
| 0:30.0 | Beijing is very concerned that this could lead to contagion across the property market, |
| 0:35.8 | you know, a liquidity crunch where there are just no more loans |
| 0:39.0 | so that firms across all markets would not be able to pay for current obligations. |
| 0:45.6 | The Evergrand Property Bust coming up on Business Daily from the BBC. |
| 1:00.5 | Protesters gathered earlier this month at Evergrand's company headquarters |
| 1:02.6 | in the southern city of Shenzhen. |
| 1:07.6 | Give us our money back, they chant, |
| 1:10.2 | ignoring police demands to disperse. |
| 1:15.6 | If I can't get my money back, I'm going to jump off your building and die right here. |
| 1:21.7 | They owe me 37 million yuan, and they went to my hometown to warn my parents to warn me not to make trouble. |
| 1:28.5 | I reported them to the authorities. |
| 1:31.7 | We small business owners can't survive much longer. |
| 1:35.2 | We need to pay the bank hundreds of thousands a month. |
| 1:39.2 | We can't hold on much longer. |
| 1:41.1 | Small-scale protests like this have been springing up all across China in the last |
| 1:45.5 | couple of weeks as reports that Evergrand China's second largest property developer is unable |
... |
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