Chapter 179: The Asian Financial Crisis IV
"Where there is inferiority, there is superiority, and the advantage of the Hong Kong dollar is obvious. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 On the one hand, the means of stabilizing the value of the Hong Kong dollar are not limited to the Exchange Fund and Exchange Fund Bills, and the new Central Real Time Gross Settlement System (CCGS) has been introduced a year ago, which will enable the Hong Kong Monetary Authority to immediately detect abnormal fluctuations in the Hong Kong dollar, identify the source of funds in a timely manner, and provide strong monitoring measures for whether the Hong Kong dollar is under attack. In other words, in the future war to defend the Hong Kong dollar, the Hong Kong government has the initiative in the war.
Second, Hong Kong's current foreign exchange reserves are as high as $82 billion, and if you add the mainland's $121 billion, the total US dollar foreign exchange reserves will exceed $200 billion. With such huge foreign exchange reserves, it is not easy for Soros to capture the Hong Kong dollar. ”
"The first two aspects are from an economic point of view, and from a political point of view, the Hong Kong dollar is unlikely to collapse. Hong Kong's return to the motherland is of great significance to the mainland, and from a political point of view, the mainland simply cannot allow the Hong Kong dollar to collapse. At the same time, the mainland wants to develop and obtain capital, technology, and talent from abroad, and Hong Kong's economy, which is a window to the outside world, cannot afford to suffer setbacks. ”
"Well, listening to the boss is better than reading for ten years." Liu Shengqiang sighed with emotion, "Since the boss thinks that the Hong Kong dollar is unlikely to collapse, how to operate in this future battle to defend the Hong Kong dollar?" ”
Crises always coexist with opportunities, especially for Hong Kong, Asia's most dynamic liberal financial centre. The monetary system of a country or region is related to the overall economy, which is specific to stocks, stock indexes, commodity futures, real estate, precious metals and other aspects.
"Speculating on Hang Seng Index stock index futures, this time I am ready to withdraw $3 billion from Xinjiapo's account." Liu Si thought for a while and asked Liu Shengqiang, "It's no problem to transfer 3 billion US dollars!" ”
"No problem, I want to draw another $3 billion." Before leaving Xinjiapo, the total profit of more than 4 billion US dollars in more than 140 accounts in Xinjiapo is Liu Shengqiang's greatest confidence.
Throughout the Asian financial crisis, the Hang Seng stock index futures suffered the most in the battle to defend the Hong Kong dollar. Although the Hong Kong dollar has depreciated, it has only fallen from 7.5 Hong Kong dollars to 1 US dollar to 7.75 Hong Kong dollars to 1 US dollar. It is insignificant compared to the Hang Seng Index, which has fallen by almost 50%. This is only discussed from the perspective of speculative objective profits, and from an economic point of view, the depreciation of the Hong Kong dollar has greatly contributed to the worries about the stability of international travel capital and Hong Kong's local capital against the Hong Kong dollar. This is also the reason why Hong Kong's local capital fell into the ground in the early stage of the Hong Kong dollar defense war.
"Well, tomorrow you will arrange channels to get this money into Hong Kong, and I hope to be able to raise funds before next Wednesday." Soros is still eyeing the Philippines, Malaysia, and Indonesia, and when Soros captures the Philippine peso and ringgit in August, he will definitely create a bloody storm in Hong Kong.
Historically, Soros began attacking the Hong Kong dollar in August. Liu Si is not sure when Soros will attack the Hong Kong dollar in his life, at least there is really not much time left for him to absorb chips.
"Boss, since the Hong Kong dollar will not collapse, can the Hang Seng Index really make a big difference?" According to the economic theory that Liu Shengqiang has studied, since the root cause of the crisis, the Hong Kong dollar, will not collapse, the Hang Seng Index should not.
"In theory, that's true. But in fact, Soros and others will definitely attack the Hang Seng Index and the Hong Kong stock market when they attack the Hong Kong dollar. If you think about Thailand, when the Thai baht did not collapse, the Thai stock market did not fall sharply, falling by more than 55%. Liu Si knows that in fact, the reason why the Hang Seng Index has fallen sharply is also the reason for the Hong Kong government's indulgence.
At that time, the Hong Kong stock market was in a very serious bubble, with a price-to-earnings ratio of nearly three times higher than two years ago. The Hong Kong government hopes to use this crisis to burst the bubble and return the Hong Kong economy to real value. At the same time, it is also to let some local capital reap the consequences. Historically, the Hong Kong government took advantage of this crisis to aggressively absorb the shares of some locally listed companies at the trough, so that the capital that rebelled and supported Soros and other European and American capitals to attack the Hong Kong dollar paid a great price after the crisis to regain the low-priced constituent stocks absorbed by the Hong Kong government using its financial reserves. These costs are significant, both politically and economically.
For the upcoming financial defense of Hong Kong, there are three main targets for Soros and European and American capital: Hong Kong dollars, Hong Kong stock markets, and Hong Kong stock index futures.
What is the difference between these three? Relatively speaking, the Hong Kong dollar is the most real, the least volatile, the stock market is slightly virtual, and the most virtualized is the stock index futures. The cost of attacking these three points is the largest, and the stock index futures are the smallest, but the return is the largest in the stock index futures, because it is the most virtual and prone to volatility.
Among the targets that can be attacked, the Hong Kong dollar is the most real, and the so-called real is compared to stocks and stock index futures. Compared with attacking the pound, attacking the Hong Kong dollar and causing the market to expect the decoupling of the Hong Kong dollar from the US dollar is more costly than attacking the pound, and the Hong Kong economy does not have too many weaknesses (the health of the Hong Kong dollar linked exchange rate is much greater than the healthy strength of the pound at the time of the attack on the pound). However, the gains are not significant, and even if the linked exchange rate is broken, the health of Hong Kong's economy will not be able to attack the baht and force a 20% depreciation of the baht.
However, attacking the Hong Kong dollar is necessary, because only by shaking the linked exchange rate of the Hong Kong dollar can it really lead to a full-scale panic in the Hong Kong market and shake investors' expectations for Hong Kong's economy. Moreover, since the previous attacks on the currencies of other Asian countries have been successful, there is an expectation that the Hong Kong dollar will be attacked, and Soros must take advantage of this expectation. Even if it's a feint, even if it's a feint with real money.
Compared with the Hong Kong dollar, the real component of the stock decreases, and the virtual component increases, why do you say that, because the stock market trading or speculation is the future development expectation of each listed company, although there is an evaluation of the normal operation of the enterprise, but the valuation is more dependent on the income that the company can bring to investors in the next few years. To put it bluntly, it is to fry the future. If the future is bleak. Valuations will fall, and holders will sell.
The factors that affect the stock price include the company's own operating conditions, including the prediction of the future development of the industry, and the expectations of the economy of the country and region where it is located also greatly affect the evaluation of the company's stock value. Especially in a region where foreign exchange is not controlled and there is no restriction on foreign investors, because the income of the enterprise is in Hong Kong dollars, if the Hong Kong dollar depreciates, when foreign investors use the future exchange rate of US dollars against Hong Kong dollars to assess their earnings, they find that even if the income of Hong Kong dollars does not decrease, once it is converted into US dollars, it will actually decrease, and once this expectation is formed, investors will reduce their investment in listed companies in Hong Kong, to put it bluntly, they will sell the stocks of Hong Kong listed companies.
Therefore, if you want to manipulate the decline of the stock market, it is also necessary to attack the Hong Kong dollar. In the case that there is no problem with the operation of the listed company and the future development of the industry, the attack on the exchange rate is the only way.
Stock index futures are the most virtual of the three, and stock index futures are gambling on the expectation of a specific period of future development of the Hong Kong stock market index, and it is almost entirely about trading expectations. Once bearish expectations of the future dominate, stock index futures fall faster than stock index futures. And can in turn influence the trading mindset of the real stock market. At the same time, since there is no limit on the trading volume of stock index futures, the trading volume of this market can be much larger than that of the actual stock market. Therefore, once the stock index futures market is controlled, the benefits are huge.
Because of this, stock index futures will fall the most, and only shorting Hang Seng Index futures will have higher profits.
Basically, Soros and other European and American capitals speculate and snipe the monetary system to form a complete system. First of all, there is a secret ambush for a large number of short positions in stock index futures, and the main source of profit will come from here. Since this short-selling stock index contract cannot make the daily stock index futures trading volume increase abnormally, it takes a long time to disperse into it. The trading margin of stock index futures is very small, basically only 5% of the transaction amount is required, so the transaction amount can be enlarged to the greatest extent. In history, Soros attacked the Hong Kong dollar twice, and it took several months to absorb stock index futures positions.
Immediately after trying to tentatively attack the local currency, and then officially start a feint, a large number of short local currency, so that the exchange rate between the local currency and the US dollar continuously touches the bottom line of the exchange rate, which can highlight the super large volume of the attack on the local currency and cause panic in the currency market.
Then, after continuously attacking the local currency, they began to continuously short the constituent stocks in the stock market, selected the stocks with poor operating conditions in the constituent stocks to sell a large number of shorts, manipulated the stock index to move downward, and at the same time shook the confidence of the local currency through the media and market rumors, causing foreign investors to sell Hong Kong stocks in order to avoid exchange rate risks, and then sell the local currency obtained from the sale of stocks through the foreign exchange market and exchange them back for US dollars to be remitted out of their home countries. At this time, the local currency market and the stock market have been linked, and a vicious circle has been formed.
Finally, it began to openly increase the trading volume of short selling of stock index futures, which attracted market attention and panic, resulting in the downward trend of stock index futures, and then forming a vicious circle between stock index futures and the stock market.
"I'll ask my subordinates on the Xinjiapo side to withdraw the funds from the account and remit them." Liu Shengqiang did not refute, listened to his boss's words, and was even more optimistic about the future of the Hong Kong dollar, "However, boss! To withdraw funds from Xinjiapo, you also need to say hello to Uncle Xu. After all, he is the custodian of all the accounts of Xinjiapo, and he can only withdraw funds from the accounts after notifying him. ”
"I mentioned to him before, I'll call tonight to say something." Liu Si affirmed Liu Shengqiang's proposal, "But you have to hurry up and transfer the funds to Hong Kong." This time the amount is a bit large, and you can find a few more banking channels to remit the funds to Hong Kong. ”
"Rest assured, boss! I'm going to get $3 billion to Hong Kong next Tuesday. Liu Shengqiang is very confident in this, after all, Hong Kong as the world's third largest financial center after New York and London, among the world's 100 largest banks, 85 have set up branches in Hong Kong, and its foreign exchange market trading volume ranks fifth in the world.