—— The cold winter of Chinese real estate is heating up; CDFG restarted the listing process of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange; the inventory of houses for sale in the United States rose by a record in June; the GPU bubble burst due to cryptocurrency; corn became the king of crops; mortgage interest rates fell after three consecutive weeks of rising.
1. China real estate winter heats up
New-home sales by China’s top 100 developers fell 43 percent to $109 billion in June from a year earlier, but rose 61.2 percent from May, according to preliminary data released by China Real Estate Information. , indicating that local governments’ support measures for the real estate industry are effective.
To help the property sector recover, local governments have eased home purchase restrictions and lowered mortgage rates. The chairman of China’s leading property developer also said this week that the industry may have bottomed out.
Interestingly, some properties have even started accepting wheat and garlic as payment methods in order to attract farmers.
On Thursday, Sunac, China’s fourth-largest developer, successfully paid off bonds settled in yuan, and its application for amortization was approved.
Selling housing inventory quickly is one of the most effective ways to address a developer’s cash flow
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2. CDFG restarts the listing in Hong Kong
China Tourism Group Duty-Free, the world’s largest travel retailer, plans to restart the process of listing on the Hong Kong stock exchange and is expected to raise between $2 billion and $3 billion, people familiar with the matter said.
CDFG, a state-owned enterprise, operates duty-free shops in China, Hong Kong, Macau, and other Southeast Asian cities.
Trapped in the harsh market environment at the time, CDFG announced in December last year that it would temporarily suspend its listing plan on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. On Wednesday, the company submitted an application for a secondary listing on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange and is expected to complete the listing as soon as August.
CDF’s $2 billion listing is expected to hit an HKEX record this year.
CDF’s $2 billion listing is expected to hit a HKEX record this year
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3. Inventory of U.S. homes for sale roses
According to the latest survey released by Realtor.com, the number of active listings in the United States rose 18.7% in June compared with a year ago, the annual increase set a record since 2017.
Such a big increase is mainly due to the reduction in the number of buyers and competition due to high mortgage rates and home prices. On the other hand, sellers are returning to the market even faster than they were before the pandemic.
While home prices are generally on the high side right now, rising inventory is good news for buyers still looking for a home.
In areas like Austin, Texas, and Phoenix, Arizona, housing inventory has doubled from a year ago. In Nashville, Tennessee, and Riverside, California, inventories rose 86% and 72%, respectively.
Although the housing inventory has risen significantly, the downward pressure on housing prices is still limited
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4. Cryptocurrencies cause the GPU bubble to burst
The recent plunge in the cryptocurrency market has not only caused heavy losses for investors but also Nvidia Corp. graphics cards, which have been fired at sky-high prices during the epidemic, have also “returned to earth.”
During the epidemic, cryptocurrencies ushered in a wave of coin mining boom, and the secondary market price of the necessary accessory graphics card (GPU) has also been rising. Some graphics card models have even been sold for 2.5 times the price.
Today, though, all cryptocurrencies have fallen in value, and currency miners have significantly less demand for graphics cards. According to estimates, cold winter in the cryptocurrency market could reduce demand for graphics cards by a third.
In May, the SEC fined Nvidia $5.5 million for failing to fully disclose the impact of cryptocurrency mining on the company’s graphics card sales.
Cryptocurrency miners are a huge user group of GPUs during the epidemic, and now GPU demand may be reduced by one-third
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5. Corn became the king of crops
According to the latest planting report from the US Department of Agriculture, the acreage of corn seeds in the United States reached 89.5 million acres in March this year, while the acreage of soybeans has decreased to 88.3 million acres from the previous 91 million acres.
The price of corn futures has risen 9% since the beginning of the year and is near an all-time high.
The increase in corn acreage over the past quarter has been tied to higher prices, said Kevin McNew, chief economist at ag-tech firm Farmers Business Network. After the price of corn rose, many farmers paid high fertilizer prices to grow as much profitable corn as possible.
With limited resources and land, farmers will choose the crops with the highest profit margins
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6. Mortgage rates fall after three straight weeks of hikes
The latest data released by Freddie Mac today showed that the average fixed-rate interest rate for 30-year mortgages in the United States this week fell to 5.7% from 5.81% last week, but it was still much higher than the 3.22% at the beginning of the year.
In April, U.S. households with a median annual income needed to set aside 41.2% of their salary to cover the cost of a median-priced home loan, the highest share since July 2006 and much higher than in 2021. 30.8% in April.
Although the affordability of housing is getting worse and worse, the market is still in a state of short supply. According to Redfin Corp., a real estate agency, 60 percent of homes that sold in May ended up selling for more than the seller’s initial listing price.
Mortgage rates are one of the biggest reasons to turn away homebuyers, hope the decline can continue
Source： WSJ – Mortgage Rates Drop After Three Weeks of Increases
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7. Wegmans leaks millions of user information
New York State Attorney General Letitia James announced that the well-known supermarket chain Wegmans will be fined $400,000 for leaking the private information of more than 3 million consumers.
The leaked information included the consumer’s name, address, mailing address, and other driver’s license numbers.
Letitia said the Wegmans had to pay for the fact that it was unforgivable in the 21st century to have such rudimentary cybersecurity systems.
In April 2021, an investigator first discovered that Wegmans user information had been exposed on Microsoft Azure and notified the Wegmans company.
Wegmans operates 107 supermarket chains in the United States and was founded in Rochester in 1916
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The content of this article comes from various financial news media such as The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, and Bloomberg.