# Shorting China



## Huskar (30 July 2012)

I have a medium term conviction about China's economy and want to try and profit from that conviction. My general macro view is that China's economy is going to falter if it has not started to do so already. Or if it does not falter, it is going to disappoint. 

Even if you disagree with my view as to direction how would you execute the trade?

This question is posed by a noob when it comes to taking advantage of the downward movement of prices. I have looked into merely shorting equities, but this seems to be all but impossible for the retail investor with relatively small amounts to deploy.

Even if I could short equities, which stocks would I target and how do I go about asset allocation on the short side?

I was looking particularly at companies with high leverage to China because that is their sole (or very large) market, eg Fortescue. High leverage and expectations at FMG merely adds to the sell-side case. 

Other listed possibilities I was looking at were ETFs eg iShares MSCI Emerging Markets (IEM) or iShares FTSE China 25 (IZZ) or even the iShares MSCI BRIC (IBK). 

In the alternative I have to resort to long US large-caps and property.

But is there a broker who lets you borrow and sell short listed stocks? Or does one have to turn to other things such as options or CFDs? And if so, how do I position my trade so that I can ride out any shorter term volatility (<6 months by my definition) and get exposure to my medium term conviction (1-3 years).

I suppose it all boils down to the more general question of how does the average retail punter go short?

Thanks for the help!


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## CanOz (30 July 2012)

Huskar said:


> I have a medium term conviction about China's economy and want to try and profit from that conviction. My general macro view is that China's economy is going to falter if it has not started to do so already. Or if it does not falter, it is going to disappoint.
> 
> Even if you disagree with my view as to direction how would you execute the trade?
> 
> ...




One of the best China bets...FXI


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## Joules MM1 (1 August 2012)

twittosterone:



> Douglas Kass ‏@DougKass
> 
> July mfg index for china was 50.1 vs exp of 50.5 and 50.2 in june. Weakest in terms of growth since nov 2011, 3 straight monthsof easing-


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