Beijing reforms: China’s lending laboratory

A few years ago local Chinese municipalities had little debt. Today they have a $1.7 trillion mountain of it, nearly all of it financing economically non-viable projects in the name of "stimulus". The proposed "solution" of course is to roll the debt over, while adding still more to the debt mountain, hoping things will get better. Please consider China tells banks to roll over loans

State-controlled banks rush to raise money from public markets to shore up their balance sheets after a year of record lending and stricter capital requirements

At first glance, the explosion of credit in China last month is good news for the world’s second-largest economy, which has been struggling to recover from the impact of the European debt crisis and a downturn in the U.S.   New loans and other forms of financing jumped to 2.54 trillion yuan in January, more than double the previous year’s 955.9 billion yuan, and well ahead of December’s 1.63 trillion yuan, government data released this month shows.  

Consumers who use online payday lenders may be taken advantage of twice: first, by the lenders’ triple-digit interest rates that flout state caps, then with fees tacked on by the borrowers’ own banks. A new report published last week by the Pew Charitable Trusts states that while consumers often turn to payday lenders in order to avoid writing bad checks or getting hit with overdraft fees, in many cases customers wind up paying overdraft and payday loan fees.

Consumers who use online payday lenders may be taken advantage of twice: first, by the lenders’ triple-digit interest rates that flout state caps, then with fees tacked on by the borrowers’ own banks. A new report published last week by the Pew Charitable Trusts states that while consumers often turn to payday lenders in order to avoid writing bad checks or getting hit with overdraft fees, in many cases customers wind up paying overdraft and payday loan fees.