Chinese working on real estate bubbles

BEIJING, Feb. 8 (UPI) -- The British bank Standard Chartered said Monday the Chinese government was attempting to softly deflate real estate bubbles in cities before they burst.

"We believe that we now have a bubble in many cities, particularly the big ones. The central government is trying to deflate these bubbles gently, rather than pop them," Standard Chartered said, the Financial Times reported.

Given previous spikes in land prices that did not crash, the bank said it was confident the Chinese government "can accomplish" the goal of getting control of the market. "But this does not mean that the land market will not experience pain during 2010-11," the bank said.

An analysis showed that the more expensive cities in China experienced the sharpest spike in land prices, which rose more than 200 percent in Shanghai in 2009, more than 50 percent in Beijing and 300 percent in Shenzhen, the Times said.