Why the Chinese Market Rose and is Now Collapsing

One word:  margin (h/t Business Insider)

Seriously this is crazy, margin amounts at a third of the Chinese peak helped crash the US market in both 2000 and 2008.  Note that in the case of Taiwan (which had margin amounts similar, but still lower than China does today), stocks were down over 60% from their margin fueled peak before they bottomed in 2001 and have yet to be higher than they were right before the Asian economic crisis.