China’s “Confrontational” Move Succeeds - Global Markets Are Plummeting

China’s “Confrontational” Move Succeeds

Global Markets Are Plummeting

Stes de Necker

Stock market watchers were horrified on Monday morning 24 August 2015 as the Dow Jones Industrial average dropped precipitously over 1,000 points just after the opening trading bell.

Though there were roller coaster-like efforts at recovery throughout the day, the market ultimately closed down by 588 points, which came on the heels of several days in a row of major market losses last week. 

The massive Monday dip is largely being blamed on China’s market correction of more than 8.5 percent, along with the European markets slipping into a full-blown bear market, causing the Volatility Index, or “fear index” to spike by nearly half.

The crashing global markets have resulted in plunging prices for commodities, including crude oil, which looks good at the gas pump, but creates dangerous ripples that can adversely affect other parts of the economy.

Possible reasons for the crashing markets include a major slowdown in China’s economy, financial uncertainty in Europe, most notably Greece, as well as the ever-present threat that the Federal Reserve will finally raise interest rates, something they have refrained from doing for too long.

According to Business Insider, Deutsche Bank’s Jim Reid said Monday, “We’ve long felt that the only thing preventing another financial crisis has been extraordinary central bank liquidity and general interventions from the global authorities which we still expect to continue for a long while yet.”

Reid added, “So when policy changes, risks arise. The genesis of this recent sell-off has been the threat of the Fed raising rates next month, but China’s confrontational move two weeks ago and the subsequent knock-on through EM have accelerated us towards something more serious.”

Speaking of China’s “confrontational move,” conservative radio and TV host Glenn Beck recently addressed the issue with a financial expert last week, saying the deliberate devaluation of China’s currency could mean “all-out economic warfare” against the West, according to The Blaze.

“They’ve launched all-out economic warfare,” chief economic researcher Jason Buttrill said. “China devalued their currency, kicking off the biggest fall in over two decades.”

He went on to explain how a weak currency helps China, due to their economy being largely based upon cheap exports, but notes how their move could lead to a “tsunami of deflation” in western economies.

He further explained how China’s move to deflate Western economies could allow them to shift from a cheap export-based economy to a more consumer-centered one, like that of America.

“Here’s the second part, and this is crucial,” he concluded. “China is trying to destroy the dollar.

They want to be the world reserve currency, and if severe deflation kicks off a depression in the Western world, the opportunity will be there for this to actually happen. … We’re seeing the beginnings of a dangerous, non-conventional war.”

The global economy is most certainly in flux right now, and China’s deliberate devaluation of their own dollar is proving to be one of the more dangerous aspects of the volatile uncertainty right now.