Fiddle away . . . Is China burning? Or is it the bottom?

I've always been more of an observer than a participant in the China story. I don't know why I've never been a China fanboy, but I guess I find it hard to believe that any totalitarian regime is worth being excited about. Anyhow, some observations from the last 24hrs:

1. Chinese official media confirmed on Tuesday that the country's largest lender, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), had suspended mortgage discounts for first-time home buyers.

2. A report by the Bank of Communications predicted that the Chinese CPI will decline to 3.3 percent year-on-year in April, compared with 3.6 percent in the previous month.

Take anyone you want - honestly take your time I have all day.

3.  Chinese real estate developer inventories continue to rise. By March 31, inventories stood at 1.37 trillion yuan, up 34.3 percent year-on-year. A Standard and Poor's report at the end of April said that the refinancing clock is ticking for the nation's 80,000-plus property developers amid weak sales, even including the industry's biggest players.

4. In April, non-manufacturing purchasing manager index was 56.1 percent, 1.9 percentage points lower than that in the previous month, still staying above the threshold, which indicated that the non-manufacturing economy has maintained a momentum of growth, but the growth has slowed down.A couple of days back the Manufacturing PMI was 53.3 percent, up by 0.2 percentage point month-on-month.

4.  Australia's economy recorded its third-straight trade deficit in March. 

So what can we conclude? My view is that the bottoming is still occurring, but maybe the China specialist sees some reason to be investing. I don't have the confidence that they have, but I'll stick to the one thing I've been saying since the start of the year, i.e. - the main market that's being effected by this process is Australia and the trade deficit is showing it, the RBA with the 50bp rate cut knows it and the government is showing it with their panic to move the budget back to surplus as they know this was a core promise of their election platform.

I'm taking a day off from exercise today. I'll be going go carting with some other Genevois tonight over in France. I haven't done this much over the years, but hopefully its a lot of fun as I need to keep my spirits up in the face of Swiss bureaucracy.

Obviously as a warm up to the racing tonight I'll be reviewing the latest news from the Giro. Today is a rest day before the opening Italian stage in Verona.

Roberto Ferrari ... watch out for me because I never check my blind spot!

I note that Ferrari the rider who caused yesterdays crash caused with 125m to go got a CHF 200 fine, a 30-second penalty and lost 25 points from his tally in the points competition for taking out the front wheel of Cavendish when deviating from his line while sprinting at about 65km/h. What a joke ... CHF 200! That's about enough for a quick bite at McDonalds in Geneva. The UCI should have sat him down for the rest of the Giro. It was a bloody disgrace.