The tepid 2016 Macau recovery may have topped on December 8th. It was earlier this month that Beijing decided to go after the Macau mass market on top of already practically destroying the VIP market, this by limiting ATM withdrawals by half. Not surprising that the Macau stock that was hurt most by this move was Melco Crown which has put its focus on the mass market. Melco dove 20% that day.

For investors that have come to terms with Chinese government mentality and have been generally aware of the war against cash by governments globally, it isn’t surprising. The more monetary pressure that gets piled on to China (the Yuan is down 7% this year and 12.5% since the Macau top), the more destructive Beijing’s economic policies will tend to become. The government will get defensive and more desperate, blaming all problems on the looseness of free markets when all of it can be blamed literally on the exact opposite.

We’re seeing the chaos unfold in India with the Indian government’s decision to demonetize its largest bills. We’re seeing it in Venezuela where an attempt to do the same led to riots in the streets. We’ll see it in China too, eventually.

Granted, the defensive response to economic and monetary stress is not unique to the Chinese government specifically. It in fact exists across all governments all around the world. All governments without exception come to power with centralized plans of varying degrees. When they all inevitably fail, the blame is placed on the people who are not following The Plan. Regulations get stricter, taxes get more onerous, capital and price controls get put in place in an attempt to make The Plan work, and business and human life in general suffers. The cycle continues until things get so bad that The Plan is inevitably abandoned and liberty makes a comeback.