http://www.prudentbear.com/2013/04/fault-lines.html
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-04-20/over-150-dead-thousands-injured-after-66-quake-strikes-chinas-sichuan-province
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 04/20/2013 09:56 -0400
Quakes in Japan.....
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-04-19/japan-quake-strikes-off-coast/4639548
Fault Lines
April 19, 2013
More pressure on commodities, commodity currencies, commodity economies and equities.
Yet another fascinating week - and one more week of anecdotes confirming the global Bubble thesis.
I have vivid memories of reading a Financial Times article back from early-1998 that detailed the massive growth in ruble derivative transactions written by the Russian Banks. Russia was front and center in my macro analysis back then. While reading the article, I recall exclaiming “I think they’ve blown themselves up.”
I saw Russia as an increasingly fragile Bubble at the time, having become acutely vulnerable to huge “hot money” outflows and Credit collapse after the catastrophic financial and economic crisis wreaked bloody havoc throughout South East Asia in 1997. Yet, a complacent market view was taking hold that the IMF and global central banks had things well under control. No way would the West ever allow a Russian collapse, or so they thought. I saw the huge build up in ruble derivatives as a likely Fault Line. If Russia succumbed, the ruble would tumble, its banks would be on the hook for unmanageable derivative losses and the sovereign would face potential meltdown. The leveraged speculators were big in Russia at the time.
I believe it was in early-2007, when my focus was squarely on an increasingly vulnerable mortgage finance Bubble. The Financial Times’ Gretchen Morgenson began writing about the $1 TN of subprime CDOs (collateralized debt obligations) that Wall Street had created during 1996. And I remember thinking, “Unbelievable, this is even worse than I suspected.” Subprime derivatives had created another historic financial Fault Line.
Memories of previous Fault Lines were jogged this week by a bevy of informative Financial Times articles (touching upon what I consider key potential Fault Lines). First, there was an article by Michael Stothard, “Naked CDS Ban Fuels Bank Funding Fears.” “It’s called the law of unintended consequences. Last November, European regulators were fed up with hedge funds using the derivatives market to bet against sovereigns so they imposed a ban on outright speculation… Six months on from the ban on buying naked sovereign CDS protection – where the investor does not own the underlying government bond – it is clear that negative bets against large financials have emerged as a partial replacement… In the first quarter volumes fell 35% to $168bn from the fourth quarter of last year, according to the DTCC, the swaps data warehouse. In the same period the volumes traded on the iTraxx Senior Financial index, one of the most liquid European indices encompassing some of the largest banks in the region, have nearly doubled from $252bn to $400bn, according to the DTCC.”
And there was “China Local Authority Debt ‘Out of Control,’” by the Financial Times’ Simon Rabinovitch: “A senior Chinese auditor has warned that local government debt is ‘out of control’ and could spark a bigger financial crisis than the US housing market crash. Zhang Ke said his accounting firm, ShineWing, had all but stopped signing off on bond sales by local governments as a result. ‘We audited some local government bond issues and found them very dangerous, so we pulled out,’ said Mr Zhang, who is also vice-chairman of China’s accounting association. ‘Most don’t have strong debt servicing abilities. Things could become very serious.’ ...Mr Zhang said many local governments had invested in projects from public squares to road repairs that were generating lacklustre returns, and so were relying on financing rollovers to pay back their creditors. ‘The only thing you can do is issue new debt to repay the old… But there will be some day down the line when this can’t go on.’ Mr Zhang added that he grew alarmed when smaller towns and counties discovered that investment vehicle bonds were an easy way to raise financing. ‘This evolution was quite frightening,’ he said.”
And the third of the Fault Line Trifecta, “Japanese Easing Plays Havoc with JGBs,” by Ben McLannahan of the Financial Times: “So much for Haruhiko Kuroda’s plans to ease the flow of credit. Since the new governor of the Bank of Japan shouldered his ‘big bazooka’ two weeks ago, promising to buy up more government bonds than ever to drive down the cost of borrowing, yields have risen at every point along the country’s 30-year sovereign debt curve, prompting some banks to charge more for loans. At the same time, trading volumes in Japanese government bonds – or JGBs – have collapsed, sending volatility to record highs and threatening the ability of the world’s most indebted government to keep funding itself at the world’s lowest rates. An auction last week of 30-year bonds was ‘horrendous’, in the words of one strategist… Net annual asset purchases by the BoJ have risen to nearly 15% of nominal gross domestic product, notes Nomura, making Mr Kuroda’s ‘new phase’ of easing significantly bigger than any equivalent operation around the world… Amid the ‘shock and awe’ of this radical policy shift, investors in Japan’s Y914tn ($9.4tn) government bond market, the world’s second-largest, have ‘lost their bearings’, says Naka Matsuzawa, chief Japan rates strategist at Nomura in Tokyo… ‘For now, the easing programme that was announced with such fanfare must be judged a failure,’ says Jun Ishii, chief fixed-income strategist at Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities.”
Unfettered global Credit coupled with government fiscal and monetary excess has been inflating major Bubbles going back to Japan’s runaway 1980’s Credit Bubble. Japanese and global policymakers have recently resorted to unmatched and untested stimulus measures with unknown consequences. And, today, mounting Bubble fragility can be discerned from all corners of the globe. Never have I seen a backdrop with Multiple Major Fault Lines.
Many profess – and it sounds pretty appealing in theory - that a moderate amount of fiscal and monetary stimulus helps grease the “post-Bubble” economic wheels. Yet inflationary cycles over time have a way of casually drifting way beyond the moderate. In reality, supposed “post-Bubble” reflations actually work predictably to inflate only bigger Bubbles. I would argue strongly that at some point along the way excessive amounts of stimulus begin fomenting exponential growth in latent instability. And I’ll add that once every few generations such dynamics become global in nature.
Today, such instability is on conspicuous display – particularly in Europe, Japan and China. Here at home, it remains for now more latent, masked by huge deficit spending, zero rates and after significant portions of US credit risk have been nationalized with federal guarantees (e.g. residential mortgage, student lending). And the more aggressive the stimulus the more various parties will try to position for competitive advantage. This sets the stage for inevitable instability, conflict and upheaval.
It’s an especially inopportune time for a speculative Bubble in European financial CDS/insurance. With French and German economies succumbing to recession, the region’s already troubled banking system remains susceptible to further asset quality deterioration. In Germany, in particular, I fear several years of ultra-low rates and financial inflows have nurtured unappreciated Bubble fragilities (DAX down 3.7% this week!). Meanwhile, the Draghi OMT backstop has incentivized the speculators back into the region’s financial markets (including higher yielding Eastern European debt). Bank debt and related derivative insurance markets appear to be a focus of speculative activities.
In my old “booming town along the river” analogy, the speculative Bubble in flood insurance worked miraculously – that is until torrential rains incited a panic to reinsure and offload risk that ended in market illiquidity and failure. The European financial sector has a plethora of unresolved issues – economic, financial, regulatory and political. Will the euro even survive? How will the costs of future bailouts be divided? What about the German and northern countries’ move to have bank investors and large depositors contribute to bailouts? It’s a troubling backdrop. Meanwhile, Draghi and global central bank measures have only further distorted markets and boosted speculative excess. When greed turns to fear and Europe’s markets again fall under duress, I’ll be carefully monitoring the functioning of bank and financial CDS markets. I worry about illiquidity.
China is a historic Bubble in the midst of what I refer to as the “terminal phase of blow-off excess.” Previous CBBs have noted the explosion in Chinese Credit since the 2008 global financial crisis. Enormous (and un-quantified) amounts of local government obligations – perhaps significant amounts intermediated through China’s ballooning “shadow banking” system – appear a systemic weak link. Apparently, much of this potentially problematic debt is integral to a historic real estate Bubble. It is, then, noteworthy that a top Chinese accountant warned this week that local debt is “out of control.”
Perhaps Chinese authorities do today have things under control. They may even have yet another big stimulus program ready to implement on command. But I suspect the popular view is too complacent. Actually, I believe the Chinese missed the timing for reigning in Bubble excess before it was too late – by a number of years. As an analyst of Credit, financial and economic Bubbles, things just don’t get more fascinating – or any more intriguing. Historic Credit expansion, historic inflationary manifestations (runaway asset Bubbles, wealth inequalities, price distortions, corruption, environmental degradation, etc.), historic risk intermediation, historic economic imbalances – and a general sanguine view domestically and internationally that the central planners can successfully manage their way through it all. Wow.
Deflation risk continues to garner considerable attention. Some have argued that Japan’s “beggar they neighbor” yen devaluation policy is imposing deflationary pressures upon its neighbors/competitors. Others would argue that the ECB needs to join the “money” printers to spur Europe out of the doldrums. I tend to view global finance and economies as extraordinarily complex systems. From my perspective, a confluence of recent factors has placed global reflation dynamics in heightened jeopardy.
Basically, highly inflated and correlated securities markets worsen global economic and financial fragility. In this regard, I would contend the confluence of Draghi’s “bazooka”, incredible QE from the Fed and BOJ, general global monetary largess, and the Chinese accommodating a runaway Credit expansion has actually only further destabilized global markets and economies. Global policy efforts have further weakened key global Fault Lines.
During the Great Depression, contemporary economic thinkers debated whether it was previous over-investment or mal-investment that was most responsible for deflation. Others pinpointed boom-time speculative shenanigans as a leading culprit that set the stage for bursting Bubbles, price collapses and financial ruin. The “Austrians” distinguished themselves for their keen understanding of how boom-time Credit excess had distorted patterns in both spending and investment – ensuring inevitable economic adjustment and hardship.
Over the years, I’ve highlighted the thinking of the old codgers (including Andrew Mellon) in the late-twenties that had witnessed enough boom and bust cycles during their lifetimes to confidently warn of impending collapse. They were convinced that attempts by our central bank to sustain a protracted inflationary boom (that commenced with the “Great War”) would risk destroying both the economy and the Credit system. These are Dr. Bernanke’s disdained “Bubble poppers.”
Well, we’ve been witnessing similar dynamics in real time. The more “money” central banks inject into the global system, the more this liquidity inflates and distorts securities markets. The greater the stimulus employed to combat deflation risk, the more the over- and mal-investment, especially in China and Asia. The more aggressively activist central banks work to inflate liquidity and market levels, the more encompassing the pool of global speculative finance working to profit from desperate policy measures. The more intensively policymakers in the U.S., Europe, Japan, China and elsewhere work to sustain (“terminal”) late-cycle global Credit excess, the more prominent the inequitable redistribution of wealth to a relatively small group of beneficiaries. We’re deeply into the phase where massive liquidity injections receive little real economy bang for the buck.
From this perspective, global policymakers are fighting like crazy in a battle they cannot win. And perhaps that’s what the markets are just beginning to indicate. Maybe, in what would be a shock to us all, global “reflation” is actually more a lost cause. Further pumping of asset Bubbles only sets the stage for bigger pops. And could air leaking out of the global commodities trade prove the first crack in the global Bubble? The commodities bull market has certainly attracted huge speculative activity, as well as having evolved into a major economic force for thousands of companies and scores of economies around the globe. Along the way, commodities players – speculators, companies and countries – have used a lot of leverage.
The true scope of borrowings and leverage employed all along the commodities/resources chain is unknown. We can safely assume it has been considerable. Hence, there is potential for commodities-related de-risking and de-leveraging dynamics to be impactful for global liquidity and risk-taking more generally. And it’s the nature of Bubble dynamics that deterioration in the liquidity backdrop for one segment tends over time to impede liquidity for another segment – and then another. We already know Europe is weak, China is overheated and Japan is playing with fire. With this in mind, it’s time to closely monitor a disconcerting number of potential Fault Lines around the globe.
Yet another fascinating week - and one more week of anecdotes confirming the global Bubble thesis.
I have vivid memories of reading a Financial Times article back from early-1998 that detailed the massive growth in ruble derivative transactions written by the Russian Banks. Russia was front and center in my macro analysis back then. While reading the article, I recall exclaiming “I think they’ve blown themselves up.”
I saw Russia as an increasingly fragile Bubble at the time, having become acutely vulnerable to huge “hot money” outflows and Credit collapse after the catastrophic financial and economic crisis wreaked bloody havoc throughout South East Asia in 1997. Yet, a complacent market view was taking hold that the IMF and global central banks had things well under control. No way would the West ever allow a Russian collapse, or so they thought. I saw the huge build up in ruble derivatives as a likely Fault Line. If Russia succumbed, the ruble would tumble, its banks would be on the hook for unmanageable derivative losses and the sovereign would face potential meltdown. The leveraged speculators were big in Russia at the time.
I believe it was in early-2007, when my focus was squarely on an increasingly vulnerable mortgage finance Bubble. The Financial Times’ Gretchen Morgenson began writing about the $1 TN of subprime CDOs (collateralized debt obligations) that Wall Street had created during 1996. And I remember thinking, “Unbelievable, this is even worse than I suspected.” Subprime derivatives had created another historic financial Fault Line.
Memories of previous Fault Lines were jogged this week by a bevy of informative Financial Times articles (touching upon what I consider key potential Fault Lines). First, there was an article by Michael Stothard, “Naked CDS Ban Fuels Bank Funding Fears.” “It’s called the law of unintended consequences. Last November, European regulators were fed up with hedge funds using the derivatives market to bet against sovereigns so they imposed a ban on outright speculation… Six months on from the ban on buying naked sovereign CDS protection – where the investor does not own the underlying government bond – it is clear that negative bets against large financials have emerged as a partial replacement… In the first quarter volumes fell 35% to $168bn from the fourth quarter of last year, according to the DTCC, the swaps data warehouse. In the same period the volumes traded on the iTraxx Senior Financial index, one of the most liquid European indices encompassing some of the largest banks in the region, have nearly doubled from $252bn to $400bn, according to the DTCC.”
And there was “China Local Authority Debt ‘Out of Control,’” by the Financial Times’ Simon Rabinovitch: “A senior Chinese auditor has warned that local government debt is ‘out of control’ and could spark a bigger financial crisis than the US housing market crash. Zhang Ke said his accounting firm, ShineWing, had all but stopped signing off on bond sales by local governments as a result. ‘We audited some local government bond issues and found them very dangerous, so we pulled out,’ said Mr Zhang, who is also vice-chairman of China’s accounting association. ‘Most don’t have strong debt servicing abilities. Things could become very serious.’ ...Mr Zhang said many local governments had invested in projects from public squares to road repairs that were generating lacklustre returns, and so were relying on financing rollovers to pay back their creditors. ‘The only thing you can do is issue new debt to repay the old… But there will be some day down the line when this can’t go on.’ Mr Zhang added that he grew alarmed when smaller towns and counties discovered that investment vehicle bonds were an easy way to raise financing. ‘This evolution was quite frightening,’ he said.”
And the third of the Fault Line Trifecta, “Japanese Easing Plays Havoc with JGBs,” by Ben McLannahan of the Financial Times: “So much for Haruhiko Kuroda’s plans to ease the flow of credit. Since the new governor of the Bank of Japan shouldered his ‘big bazooka’ two weeks ago, promising to buy up more government bonds than ever to drive down the cost of borrowing, yields have risen at every point along the country’s 30-year sovereign debt curve, prompting some banks to charge more for loans. At the same time, trading volumes in Japanese government bonds – or JGBs – have collapsed, sending volatility to record highs and threatening the ability of the world’s most indebted government to keep funding itself at the world’s lowest rates. An auction last week of 30-year bonds was ‘horrendous’, in the words of one strategist… Net annual asset purchases by the BoJ have risen to nearly 15% of nominal gross domestic product, notes Nomura, making Mr Kuroda’s ‘new phase’ of easing significantly bigger than any equivalent operation around the world… Amid the ‘shock and awe’ of this radical policy shift, investors in Japan’s Y914tn ($9.4tn) government bond market, the world’s second-largest, have ‘lost their bearings’, says Naka Matsuzawa, chief Japan rates strategist at Nomura in Tokyo… ‘For now, the easing programme that was announced with such fanfare must be judged a failure,’ says Jun Ishii, chief fixed-income strategist at Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities.”
Unfettered global Credit coupled with government fiscal and monetary excess has been inflating major Bubbles going back to Japan’s runaway 1980’s Credit Bubble. Japanese and global policymakers have recently resorted to unmatched and untested stimulus measures with unknown consequences. And, today, mounting Bubble fragility can be discerned from all corners of the globe. Never have I seen a backdrop with Multiple Major Fault Lines.
Many profess – and it sounds pretty appealing in theory - that a moderate amount of fiscal and monetary stimulus helps grease the “post-Bubble” economic wheels. Yet inflationary cycles over time have a way of casually drifting way beyond the moderate. In reality, supposed “post-Bubble” reflations actually work predictably to inflate only bigger Bubbles. I would argue strongly that at some point along the way excessive amounts of stimulus begin fomenting exponential growth in latent instability. And I’ll add that once every few generations such dynamics become global in nature.
Today, such instability is on conspicuous display – particularly in Europe, Japan and China. Here at home, it remains for now more latent, masked by huge deficit spending, zero rates and after significant portions of US credit risk have been nationalized with federal guarantees (e.g. residential mortgage, student lending). And the more aggressive the stimulus the more various parties will try to position for competitive advantage. This sets the stage for inevitable instability, conflict and upheaval.
It’s an especially inopportune time for a speculative Bubble in European financial CDS/insurance. With French and German economies succumbing to recession, the region’s already troubled banking system remains susceptible to further asset quality deterioration. In Germany, in particular, I fear several years of ultra-low rates and financial inflows have nurtured unappreciated Bubble fragilities (DAX down 3.7% this week!). Meanwhile, the Draghi OMT backstop has incentivized the speculators back into the region’s financial markets (including higher yielding Eastern European debt). Bank debt and related derivative insurance markets appear to be a focus of speculative activities.
In my old “booming town along the river” analogy, the speculative Bubble in flood insurance worked miraculously – that is until torrential rains incited a panic to reinsure and offload risk that ended in market illiquidity and failure. The European financial sector has a plethora of unresolved issues – economic, financial, regulatory and political. Will the euro even survive? How will the costs of future bailouts be divided? What about the German and northern countries’ move to have bank investors and large depositors contribute to bailouts? It’s a troubling backdrop. Meanwhile, Draghi and global central bank measures have only further distorted markets and boosted speculative excess. When greed turns to fear and Europe’s markets again fall under duress, I’ll be carefully monitoring the functioning of bank and financial CDS markets. I worry about illiquidity.
China is a historic Bubble in the midst of what I refer to as the “terminal phase of blow-off excess.” Previous CBBs have noted the explosion in Chinese Credit since the 2008 global financial crisis. Enormous (and un-quantified) amounts of local government obligations – perhaps significant amounts intermediated through China’s ballooning “shadow banking” system – appear a systemic weak link. Apparently, much of this potentially problematic debt is integral to a historic real estate Bubble. It is, then, noteworthy that a top Chinese accountant warned this week that local debt is “out of control.”
Perhaps Chinese authorities do today have things under control. They may even have yet another big stimulus program ready to implement on command. But I suspect the popular view is too complacent. Actually, I believe the Chinese missed the timing for reigning in Bubble excess before it was too late – by a number of years. As an analyst of Credit, financial and economic Bubbles, things just don’t get more fascinating – or any more intriguing. Historic Credit expansion, historic inflationary manifestations (runaway asset Bubbles, wealth inequalities, price distortions, corruption, environmental degradation, etc.), historic risk intermediation, historic economic imbalances – and a general sanguine view domestically and internationally that the central planners can successfully manage their way through it all. Wow.
Deflation risk continues to garner considerable attention. Some have argued that Japan’s “beggar they neighbor” yen devaluation policy is imposing deflationary pressures upon its neighbors/competitors. Others would argue that the ECB needs to join the “money” printers to spur Europe out of the doldrums. I tend to view global finance and economies as extraordinarily complex systems. From my perspective, a confluence of recent factors has placed global reflation dynamics in heightened jeopardy.
Basically, highly inflated and correlated securities markets worsen global economic and financial fragility. In this regard, I would contend the confluence of Draghi’s “bazooka”, incredible QE from the Fed and BOJ, general global monetary largess, and the Chinese accommodating a runaway Credit expansion has actually only further destabilized global markets and economies. Global policy efforts have further weakened key global Fault Lines.
During the Great Depression, contemporary economic thinkers debated whether it was previous over-investment or mal-investment that was most responsible for deflation. Others pinpointed boom-time speculative shenanigans as a leading culprit that set the stage for bursting Bubbles, price collapses and financial ruin. The “Austrians” distinguished themselves for their keen understanding of how boom-time Credit excess had distorted patterns in both spending and investment – ensuring inevitable economic adjustment and hardship.
Over the years, I’ve highlighted the thinking of the old codgers (including Andrew Mellon) in the late-twenties that had witnessed enough boom and bust cycles during their lifetimes to confidently warn of impending collapse. They were convinced that attempts by our central bank to sustain a protracted inflationary boom (that commenced with the “Great War”) would risk destroying both the economy and the Credit system. These are Dr. Bernanke’s disdained “Bubble poppers.”
Well, we’ve been witnessing similar dynamics in real time. The more “money” central banks inject into the global system, the more this liquidity inflates and distorts securities markets. The greater the stimulus employed to combat deflation risk, the more the over- and mal-investment, especially in China and Asia. The more aggressively activist central banks work to inflate liquidity and market levels, the more encompassing the pool of global speculative finance working to profit from desperate policy measures. The more intensively policymakers in the U.S., Europe, Japan, China and elsewhere work to sustain (“terminal”) late-cycle global Credit excess, the more prominent the inequitable redistribution of wealth to a relatively small group of beneficiaries. We’re deeply into the phase where massive liquidity injections receive little real economy bang for the buck.
From this perspective, global policymakers are fighting like crazy in a battle they cannot win. And perhaps that’s what the markets are just beginning to indicate. Maybe, in what would be a shock to us all, global “reflation” is actually more a lost cause. Further pumping of asset Bubbles only sets the stage for bigger pops. And could air leaking out of the global commodities trade prove the first crack in the global Bubble? The commodities bull market has certainly attracted huge speculative activity, as well as having evolved into a major economic force for thousands of companies and scores of economies around the globe. Along the way, commodities players – speculators, companies and countries – have used a lot of leverage.
The true scope of borrowings and leverage employed all along the commodities/resources chain is unknown. We can safely assume it has been considerable. Hence, there is potential for commodities-related de-risking and de-leveraging dynamics to be impactful for global liquidity and risk-taking more generally. And it’s the nature of Bubble dynamics that deterioration in the liquidity backdrop for one segment tends over time to impede liquidity for another segment – and then another. We already know Europe is weak, China is overheated and Japan is playing with fire. With this in mind, it’s time to closely monitor a disconcerting number of potential Fault Lines around the globe.
* * *
Big quake today in China....
Over 150 Dead, Thousands Injured After 6.6 Quake Strikes China's Sichuan Province
In all the jubilation last night following the capture of the 19 year terrorism suspect, virtually everyone missed news that a massive 7.0 magnitude quake according to the China Earthquake Administration (and 6.6 according to the USGS including countless aftershocks) hit China's Sichuan province, leaving at least 156 dead and over 2200 injured according to the latest estimate from Xinhua. The epicenter was not too far from the infamous earthquake five years ago when 70,000 people died, and millions were left homeless as a result. The earthquake occurred at 8.02 a.m. (0002 GMT) in Lushan county near Ya'an city and the epicentre had a depth of 12 km (7.5 miles), the U.S. Geological Survey said. The quake was felt by residents in neighbouring provinces and in the provincial capital of Chengdu, causing many people to rush out of buildings, according to accounts on China's Twitter-like Sina Weibo microblogging service.
The 6.6-magnitude quake wrecked buildings, cut power and blocked roads in Lushan county, killing more than 100 and injuring hundreds, officials say.Rescuers are struggling to get through to the worst-affected areas because of aftershocks and landslides.Tens of thousands were killed in a quake that hit Sichuan in 2008.The latest quake, initially reported as of 7.0 magnitude, struck at 08:02 local time (00:02 GMT).Its epicentre was in a rural area some 115km (70 miles) west of provincial capital Chengdu, according to the US Geological Survey (USGS).State broadcaster CCTV showed images of injured people being taken to hospital in Lushan.One injured man told the channel:"We still live in our old house, the new one is not ready yet. Our house just collapsed. Everything collapsed."The quake was measured at 12km below the surface, a shallow depth that usually indicates extensive damage.Aerial shots of Lushan showed buildings collapsed or without roofs.Power has been lost in the area, water supplies have been cut and telephone lines are also down.People in Chengdu felt the tremor and came running into the streets wrapped in blankets.Chengdu resident Aaron Ozment told the BBC there was huge confusion in the city."I threw on a some clothes quickly and made my way into the courtyard of my complex," he said."Making calls was almost impossible; everybody was trying to contact everybody they knew."Residents in the nearest city to the epicentre, Ya'an, felt jolts from the quake and aftershocks, but the city does not appear to have suffered major damage.State news agency Xinhua said more than 6,000 soldiers had been despatched to help with rescue efforts.Premier Li Keqiang is travelling to Sichuan to oversee the operation."The current most urgent issue is grasping the first 24 hours since the quake's occurrence, the golden time for saving lives," Mr Li was quoted as saying by Xinhua.The 2008 disaster in Sichuan left five million people homeless.
Don't expect to read much more about this: we live in a world in which hundreds dead thousands of miles away is an out of sight, out of mind statistic, while the capture of one 19 year old deranged youth is cause of edge of your seat realty TV drama and entertainment.
As for China, following the toxic Beijing smog blanket, the animal apocalypse and the bird flu breakout, an onslaught of earthquakes somehow did seem as a logical next step.
Quakes in Japan.....
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-04-19/japan-quake-strikes-off-coast/4639548
Quake strikes off Japan coast
Updated
A major magnitude 7.2 earthquake has struck off northern Japan, but no tsunami warning has been issued.
The US Geological Survey recorded the quake's depth at 122 kilometres.
The epicentre was 275 kilometres north-east of Kuril'sk in the Russian-administered Kuril Island chain, 1,490 kilometres north of Tokyo.
The quake rocked towns in the northernmost Japanese prefecture of Hokkaido.
"We have received no reports of damage so far," a spokesman at the Hokkaido police said, adding there were no reports of injuries.
Buildings in Tokyo also shook from the quake.
On Wednesday, a series of earthquakes, including one with a preliminary magnitude of 6.2, hit Japan's Miyake island, about 180km south of Tokyo.
ABC/wires
M4.7 hit east offshore of Chiba, max seismic intensity was 4
Posted by Mochizuki on April 19th, 2013 · No Comments
Major earthquakes keep happening in Japan.
After M6.3 hit Awaji island on 4/13, M6.2 hit Miyake-jima and M5.8 hit Miyagi offshore on 4/17 with countless minor quakes.
(cf, Geographical Survey Institute, “M6.2 caused Miyake-jima diastrophism of 2cm to NE” [URL])
At 23:11 of 4/19/2013 (JST), M4.7 hit east offshore of Chiba. The maximum seismic intensity was 4. The depth of epicenter was 10km.
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