Fine China

A giant shark loan ponzi scheme.

My hometown is zhejiang, now I live in shanghai, my sister pledged her home to bank, she lived in hangzhou, she bought her home around 500,0000rmb five years ago, now her home worth 2million rmb, so she can get huge loan from bank, she gave this loan to a shark loan company with 30% return every year, she has been doing and living on this for 4 years, she is a middle school teacher, she earned 4000rmb per month, but with this lending arrangement, she has been able to buy a car, the interest income is 6 times of her salary, One of my cousin's father lost all his principle of 4 million since one scheme blow up in 2008. That is my personal experience. 2 months ago I went back to my hometown in new year, this is 3 tier city, but many so investment companies shop in the street, and in 2009, I saw the so called investment companies( shark loan) opened in the town level, I visited four small towns, I saw there is shark loan shop in every town. China media is controlled, so you can't find many negative exposure, but if you dig a little bit deep, by doing some search for shark loan in Chinese, you will find out how serious the problem is. In my home town a 150 million ponzi scheme blow up in 2008, the leader turned himself in after he paid all the local official leader in full, and he felt safe enough knowing he will be protected, but my cousin's father was not so lucky for his 4 million, since he do not get his money back. Some people compare this bubble to Japan, to be fair, what happened in China real estate, the madness, the greedy, the loan shark with 100 % interest rate, it is much, much worse.