What commodities can benefit from US-Sino tension ?

What commodities can benefit from US-Sino tension ?

seems crude oil should be one.

And what else in your opinion?
 
Haven't thought about commodities in this context, but in equities
I would say the US semiconductor companies are already making big losses (and losing markets) b/c they can't sell their products anymore due to Trump's idiotic sanctions policy against China.
 
not many commodities were affected.

occassionally US China talked about soya trade war. Then soya price would move.
 
One important thing to keep in mind: China is the biggest creditor in the world (surpassing World Bank, the IMF and all OECD creditors governments combined!), while the US is now the world's largest debtor.

If China wants to collect its US Treasuries (more than 1 Trillion USD), game over for the US dollar and the entire American economy.

Of course it is not in China's interest to do that, but still.
 
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If China wants to collect its US Treasuries (more than 1 Trillion USD), game over for the US dollar and the entire American economy.

Of course it is not in China's interest to do that, but still.

China could sell their U.S. Treasury securities for USD but can't force early repayment.
https://www.quora.com/If-the-Chines...t-might-the-consequences-be/answers/176922872
Erik Fair
·
October 27, 2019
Studied Computer Science & Economics at University of California, Berkeley (Graduated 1983)
Originally Answered: What would happen if China asked the USA to pay all the debt it owes it?
Treasury Bonds and Notes aren't redeemable at the U.S. Department of Treasury, by China or anyone else. Holders of treasury securities (bills, notes, bonds, a.k.a. “treasuries”) have loaned U.S. Dollar cash to Federal Government of the United States, and that contract has a “maturity” term from 30-days to 30-years - the answer to a pleading “pay me [early] now” is “no, that’s not what the contract pemits.”

Independent of redemption, there is a very liquid market for treasury securities, so the Chinese can sell their holdings on the open market for whatever they can get for them.

Of course, what they'll get in all cases (redeemed or sold) is U.S. dollars, which then gives them a currency exchange problem. What to exchange for? Chinese Yuan (Renminbi)? Or perhaps they'd choose to buy up hard Assets of some other kind with all that USD.

The Chinese hold $1.1035 trillion of the $22 trillion U.S. Public (national) Debt as of August 2019:

This hypothetical scenario is somewhat similar to PIMCO deciding that its holdings of the Sovereign Debt of Greece (denominated in Euro (currency)) were not likely to be paid back (i.e., that the Greeks were likely to engage in a Sovereign Default); PIMCO carefully and quietly sold off all their Greek bonds in 2008 (I don't know what they did with the resulting pile of Euros – German Bunds, perhaps?) and then announced that they had done so. This sparked the Greek Debt Crisis and really did lead to the Greek default (I know, I know, they don't call it that, it's not a "formal" default, but what the hell else do you call it when the bondholders take an 80% haircut (loss)?). PIMCO got out before everything got hit, and very probably got most of its value by being quiet about it beforehand.

Could the Chinese get out quietly before le déluge? Um, probably not – their holdings are large (no, I don't know what percentage of total outstanding Greek debt PIMCO had in its portfolio when they decided to sell - I await accurate, relevant answers to What percentage of the sovereign debt of Greece did PIMCO own when they decided to sell it all in 2007/2008?), odds are good that someone would notice (probably some bear on Zero Hedge). Besides, we can look at what happened to The Economy of Greece when the crisis hit for possible effects of a big selloff in treasuries here.

In their case, Interest Rates on Greek debt rose as high as 50% for 2-year debt. They had to significantly reduce the size of their government (fire lots of government workers), reduce their Social Welfare payments, and shore up their inefficient, corrupt tax collection system while going hat-in-hand to the rest of the European Union to borrow yet more to float themselves because the private debt markets would not buy any Greek debt. When you can't borrow money, you have to operate on cash basis: you can only spend what cash you have in hand, or taxes you can actually collect. Or start selling assets, which they did.

So, for the USA ...

First, there is already some doubt about the Credit Ratings of the USA due to the Fiscal Policy (U.S. Federal Budget) irresponsibility of our Congress – that's why the United States Credit Rating Downgrade happened. China dumping all its U.S. treasury security holdings would be a worse expression of lack of confidence so the expectation is that interest rates (yields) on treasuries would rise.

Second, when bond prices fall, bond interest rates rise. Why would prices fall? Oversupply from the Chinese dumping their holdings. The U.S. public debt has a large component of short term debt that rolls over constantly (since we're not paying it down), but that makes it like Credit Card debt: floating rate. If interest rates rise a lot, boy howdy are we going to hurt. Right now, we're paying (averaged over the whole debt) about 3%, and that takes 20% of federal tax revenues to cover. If rates rise some, that percentage of revenues required to cover will go up, a lot. See:

So, third: we'll be forced to actually cut federal expenditures to within our tax revenues to cover (raise taxes? Uh, yeah, you could try, but it would fail and weaken Economic Growth (compounding the disaster); see Can the U.S. Congress reduce the federal budget deficit by raising taxes?). Real, honest to god expenditure cuts, not merely "reduced increases" (which our disingenuous politicians scream are "cuts").

We have massive federal tax revenues: in excess of $3 trillion dollars every year. Unfortunately, the Congress spends vastly more than that, and they've been borrowing to cover (that's what the annual U.S. Federal Budget Deficit is). Stupid. That's why the national debt is as of this writing over $22 trillion - every annual budget deficit gets added to the total outstanding national debt.

Recession of The U.S. Economy? Probably.

How deep? Depends on how quickly we readjust our Economic Policy to cope.

Inflation of the U.S. Dollar? Mmm, maybe. Depends on how quickly the U.S. Federal Reserve acts to prevent/forestall it, as is their legal mandate in the Federal Reserve Act of 1913.

All of this depends on a big assumption: that the Chinese take the $1.1 trillion dollars of cash they get for selling off the bonds and do something to remove that value from the space of all trade in USD, i.e., the world of International Trade (the USD is the world's Reserve Currency, remember?). If they decide to buy hard assets that are still part of our world, that changes the outcome.

Think about it this way: PIMCO abandoned Greece, but not Europe or the Eurozone (I'm sure PIMCO still has holdings of the sovereign debt of many Eurozone nations whose credit ratings are unsullied or relatively less sullied), there were and still are many other places than Greece that one can invest or spend Euros. To a degree, that's true of the USD, also; so if $1.1 trillion moves out of treasuries and is invested in some other USD-denominated asset classes …

Giant Chinese Venture Capital Fund, anyone? Maybe they’ll fund the next WeWork (company) like the SoftBank Vision Fund!

It's like a larger-scale example of
If you owe the bank $100 that's your problem. If you owe the bank $100 million, that's the bank's problem.

J. Paul Getty
 
What commodities can benefit from US-Sino tension ?

seems crude oil should be one.

And what else in your opinion?

Neither US or China are big producers of crude oil so not sure if crude oil is one. Two commodities that I can think of that would benefit from the tension are weapons and uranium. LOL
 
One important thing to keep in mind: China is the biggest creditor in the world (surpassing World Bank, the IMF and all OECD creditors governments combined!), while the US is now the world's largest debtor.

If China wants to collect its US Treasuries (more than 1 Trillion USD), game over for the US dollar and the entire American economy.

Of course it is not in China's interest to do that, but still.

No matter how large of a creditor China is, it is still not the majority holder of the US Treasuries. 99% of the US Treasuries is still held by the American people. Only 1% of the US Treasuries is held by foreign powers and even among the foreign holders, China only holds 25% of the entire 1% of the US Treasuries so it's in no position of forcing a "game over" for US in terms of economy or its currency position.

And honestly with China still a net exporter to the US, it would be committing economic suicide if it wants to destroy the US dollar. And in fact every single country has incentive to keep the US dollar as the reserve currency and is the most expensive currency in the world other than the pound and the swiss franc. That means they can dump their s*** much easier onto the American market in this global economy. Imagine if the Belgian franc is more expensive than the US dollar, how many people do you think would buy the Belgian chocolate no matter how wonderful it tastes when there is Mars bars that cost just 50 cents?
 
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These are just squabbles. Trump as we know put the economy above all else, China are highly focused of "saving face " and propaganda. Its all just sabre rattling in my view .
The banning Wechat is a huge topic here in china and the hypocrisy is just laughable from the Chinese side. There will an agreement in which both side claim they won.

Its an interesting topic , I have had these frank discussions several times in my class with managers, most are CPC members. Their attitude is that if Western governments do too much whinging and no action (hows the punishment for China going on due to the Virus going? That will be forgotten). For example they say if Western governments want nothing to do with China why are they scrambling all over themselves to come here, like Microsoft, Amazon, Tessla, AMD, Dell, Apple etc. They fully admit the playing field is not level by any means but say their Chairmen is the leader of China not the USA, his duty is to the Chinese people not to the world.

They look at the facts and ignore the tantrums Also they are baffled by the twitter wars and peoples need to vent all the time. It just doesn't comprehend with them . The other aspect is that they play the long game, they know Trump will go at some point where as the CPC are in place for decades to come. Trump like any president can reply on quick and empty promises, bluster to win elections (last time it was the Wall, this time it will be 'lets get China' folks) , whereas they XijinPing (like Putin) is their for life

They are certainly no militay threat but they are taking over the world by stealth and economic policy (e.g. Africa) while USA and Europe get caught up in internal squabbles.
 
What commodities can benefit from US-Sino tension ?

seems crude oil should be one.

And what else in your opinion?
Basically nothing because we're so heavily dependent on China. It's cheaper to import than to manufacture domestically.
 
Neither US or China are big producers of crude oil so not sure if crude oil is one. Two commodities that I can think of that would benefit from the tension are weapons and uranium. LOL

I think some weapons are fueled by energy from crude oil
 
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