Sunday brings a historic moment for Xi Jinping’s political legacy, but investors are far less excited about the prospects of a market turnaround: Chinese stocks have never performed so poorly in the run-up to any Communist Party Congress.
The Shanghai Composite Index lost more than 5 per cent over the past month, its worst pre-Congress showing since the gauge’s inception in 1991. The yuan is down more than 10 per cent this year against the dollar, heading for the worst annual performance since 1994. China’s dollar-denominated junk bonds have plunged to near record lows amid a widening fallout of a property crisis.
