If "China's 40-Year Boom Is Over" (per WSJ), what's next for companies like Greenland facing complex calculations, and big upfront costs, in Brooklyn?

From the Wall Street Journal today, China's 40-Year Boom Is Over. What Comes Next?, with the subheading, "The economic model that took the country from poverty to great-power status seems broken, and everywhere are signs of distress."

From the article:

What worked when China was playing catch-up makes less sense now that the country is drowning in debt and running out of things to build. Parts of China are saddled with under-used bridges and airports. Millions of apartments are unoccupied . Returns on investment have sharply declined.

Beyond the broken model, China faces "unfavorable demographics"--the impact of the one-child policy on a shrinking labor force--and some economic de-linking by former trade allies.

That said, the authors cite "China's burgeoning electric-vehicle and renewable energy industries," as well as the country's capacity to focus investment on innovation.

However, the "housing bubble has since popped," major developers like Country Garden face possible default, and China could face a slowdown not unlike that of Japan, which saw real estate overblown in the1990s. 

This has wide potential implications in terms of domestic relations and foreign policy, including China's stated desire to gain control of self-governing Taiwan, the home to key semi-conductor industry production.

And in Brooklyn

For watchers of Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park, though, this is all background to help divine the intentions of Greenland USA, the arm of Shanghai-based Greenland Holdings, which has a precarious credit rating and just plunged in the Fortune Global 500.

As I've written, it's worth recalling a warning at a 3/28/14 board meeting of Empire State Development (ESD), the gubernatorial-directed state authority that oversees/shepherds Atlantic Yards, which was considering the expected invement by Greenland USA, buying 70% of the project going forward--excepting the arena and the modular 461 Dean tower--from original developer Forest City.

Gib Veconi of the Prospect Heights Neighborhood Development Council focused on the state’s failure to consider the option of bringing in other developers.

The pending Greenland transaction would not represent a multiple-developer strategy, Veconi observed, but rather a single-source development project, one "under the control of a partner exposed to one of the world’s most volatile economies.”

The transaction, of course, proceeded, and Greenland changed the project's name to Pacific Park Brooklyn, likely to gain distance from controversy over "Atlantic Yards."

After the joint venture built three towers together, Greenland bought out all but 5% of Forest City's share, later leasing three sites to other developers and partnering with another on a fourth site.

But Greenland's still in control, facing a May 2025 affordable housing deadline it can't meet and a massive required investment in a platform before six towers can be built over the Vanderbilt Yard.

One factor, of course, is the absence of the 421-a tax break--and the possibility it will be replaced by ESD. But surely Greeland's obligations in China, and its assessment of the economic picture there, are key factors, ones it's not discussing publicly.