Source: Sinosphere, NYT (7/8/15)
Plunge in Chinese Stocks Leads to Bull Market for Gallows Humor
By Austin Ramzy
Investors discussing stock prices at a trading firm in Hangzhou on Wednesday.Credit Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
The plunge in Chinese stock markets has created widespread uncertainty and losses for millions of investors who only recently had enjoyed remarkable gains. The drop-offs have been so steep that many shares stopped trading after their declines hit the maximum 10 percent daily limit.
But one market has boomed amid the gloom: gallows humor. On social media the market routs and fumbling government efforts to stop them have triggered an explosion of jokes, as Chinese investors try to find ways to ease the pain.
“Actual record of the Chinese government’s market rescue,” reads one Twitter post that accompanies a clip of a tow truck righting a flipped car, only for the car to roll off the road. . .
One joke, posted by Song Ma, looks at what sort of securities could soldier on in such a negative market:
“11:10 a.m. on July 7, 2015 was a dark moment that will inevitably be written into the history of the A shares market, not because the Growth Enterprise Index was down 5.71 percent, but because 51 out of 100 stocks on the index halted trading, and 48 were stopped because they dropped the maximum allowed. Only Lepu Medical, which was down 8.97 percent, hasn’t stopped trading. Only a company that treats mental illness hasn’t stopped trading….”
Several jokes on Sina Weibo tried to explain the sudden turnaround from boom to bust.
“Last month, when the market was rising, the dog ate the same as what I ate,” went one. “Last week, when the market fell, I ate the same as the dog ate. This week I might eat the dog.”
Another joke chronicled the violent ride through the progression of an investor’s reading list:
“Securities Investment Studies,” “Trusts and Leases,” “Study of Financial Markets,” “Logic of Securities Analysis” ….
“How the Steel Was Tempered,” “Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind,” “Buddhist Sutras,” “Lao-tze” ….
“Guide to Treating Neck Conditions,” “Daily Therapy for Slipped Disks,” “Guide to Lowering High-Blood Pressure” ….
“To Live” ….
Images tweeted by Patrick Chovanec, the managing director at Silvercrest Asset Management, show the turnabout from the halcyon, somewhat hallucinatory feel of Monday morning, when markets shot up briefly following the announcement of a government plan for brokerages to buy shares of key companies, to Wednesday, when the authorities seemed to lose any ability to foster stability.
When will things turn around? An image of Anne Hathaway and Matthew McConaughey from the science fiction movie “Interstellar” takes a guess:
“Gravity is so great here that one hour is like seven years on Earth,” she says.
“Great,” he replies. “Let’s just wait here for the next bull market.”
Yufan Huang contributed research.