Take a look at the fusion of capitalism and communism in the village of Huaxi and the opening of their skyscraper. Its taller than the Chrysler Building and has a Oxen on the 60th floor that is made out of one ton of gold.
The Secrets of China’s Richest Village
Is this a case of what goes up, must come down?
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“… if you ever leave the village, you lose just about everything. Your house, your money, your benefits… But the way Huaxi villagers like Zhao Yukai see it, when you’re already living in the best place in China, or indeed the world, why would you ever want to leave?”
A day after Halloween… now that’s really creepy.
Who was the economist who had a theory about sky scrapers and boom bust cycles
That was me. Got my eye on the skyline of China.
US$ 55 million in gold? doesn’t that sound a little exaggerated?
Nope that is correct. Here is the math that I did. I assumed they were talking about 1 metric ton. Also, if you assume they built the bull when gold was higher, then they probably spent a couple more million dollars.
1 Metric ton = 35273 ounces
1 Troy ounce = 1.09 ounces
35273 / 1.09 = 32360.55 troy ounces
1 Troy ounce = $1,711.80 (current market value)
32360.55 * 1,711.80 = $55,394,790.28
I suspect they used 10 caret gold and then put a coat of 24 caret gold on the outside. Never take a bull by its cover, especially in China
Haha, Probably.
Perhaps it was a lead bull with a gold coating on the outside. You’ll need to bite it and see.
Sione
That ox is now crying to be stolen à la Ocean’s 11.
My 12 year old daughter asked me the other day why you don’t get many tall building in rural areas. I tried to explain that in areas with high land costs it sometimes made economic sense to build upwards rather than outwards.
Looks like that China has found a way to bypass the laws of supply and demand, though.
At least they bought some gold!
I think the Chinese central bank has also been buying gold. Anyone got the details?
The building of skyscrapers forecasts lower stock market returns. It’s a sign of excess.
“ In the three to five years after the construction of a record-breaking new skyscraper began, per annum stock market returns are around 10 percentage points lower than in other years.”
“Tower Building and Stock Market Returns”
Gunter Löffler
University of Ulm – Department of Mathematics and Economics
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1787517
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