Snow has been reported across forested upland areas in northern Laos as the extreme cold snap and associated precipitation persisting across much of Indochinese Peninsula since Sunday begins to ease, China's Xinhua news agency reported.

Temperatures in the low single digits Celsius during the day and around zero degrees or below at night since Sunday were accompanied by snow across elevated areas of the country's northern provinces.

The cold snap led to a temporary three-day suspension of domestic flights by the national carrier Lao Airlines between the capital Vientiane and the airport servicing the province of Oudoumxay while flights to other affected provincial centres faced delays, state-run media Vientiane Times reported.

In the province of Phongsaly, three-day extended leave was provided to public servants except police and defence personnel until Wednesday to help minimise the risks to life from unnecessary travel.

Public schools across the country already closed for a week long break awaiting a decision on whether to reopen on schedule Monday depending on the weather.

The scope of the socio-economic impact of the cold snap upon the least developed country of some six and a half million remains as yet unknown, with livestock and poultry deaths in the affected areas continuing to be reported to the authorities.

Meanwhile, images of the rare sprinkling of white have been shared by locals and visitors alike on social media.

Snow was also recorded at popular tourist destination Nam Et-Phou Louey National Park, a 4,229sqkm nature reserve incorporating parts of the provinces of Luang Prabang, Huaphan and Xiengkhouan boasting a peak elevation of 2,257m above sea level.

Images of white-dusted tropical foliage were shared on the website of the park and its award-winning Night Safari, an ethical tourism venture that provides visitors with views of the area's rare and endangered fauna while sustaining local employment. – Bernama, January 28, 2016.

See more at: http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/world/article/cold-weather-brings-rare-snowfalls-to-tropical-laos#sthash.N9EhDBXg.dpuf

Over the past year, we have frequently warned that the biggest financial risk (if not social, which in the form of soaring worker unrest is a far greater threat to Chinese civilization) threatening China, is its runaway non-performing loans, which at anywhere between 10 and20% of total bank assets, mean that China is one chaotic default away from collapsing into the post "Minsky Moment" singlarity where it can no longer rollover its bad debt, leading to a debt supernova and full financial collapse. And as China's total leverage keeps rising, and according to at least one estimate is now a gargantuan 350% of GDP (incidentally the same as the US), the threat of a rollover "glitch" gets exponentially greater.

To be sure, in recent months the topic of China's bad debt has gained increasingly more prominence among the mainstream, and notably none other than Kyle Bass has made the bursting of China's credit cycle the basis for his short Yuan trade as noted here previously:

And judging by the surge in recent and increasingly louder calls for a Chinese devaluation, some advocating a major one-off currency debasement, Bass' perspective is certainly prevalent among the trading community. Bank of America goes so far as to speculate that the "upcoming G20 meeting in Shanghai offers an opportunity for policy makers to seize the “expectations” initiative via a one-off China devaluation." It does, however, also add that the "risk is markets need to panic first" before instead of piecemeal devaluation, China follows through with a Plaza Accord-type currency intervention.

Friday's adoption of NIRP by Japan, which send the US Dollar soaring, has only made any upcoming future Chinese devaluation even more likely.

But whether China devalued or not, one thing is certain: it is next to impossible for China - under the current socio economic and financial regime - to stop the relentless growth in NPLs, which even by conservative estimates at in the trillion(s), accounting for at least 10% of China's GDP.

Sure enough, a cursory skimming of news from China reveals that even Chinese bankers now "admit the NPL situation is dire, but will keep on lending" anyway.

As the Chiecon blog notes, NPL "ratios might be closer to 10%... supported by revelations in thisarticle, where Chinese bankers complain of missing performance targets, spiraling bad loans, and end of year pay cuts."

But the main reason why China is now trapped, and on one hand is desperate to stabilize its economy and stop growing its levereage at nosebleed levels, while on the other hand it is under pressure to issue more loans while at the same time it is unwilling to write off bad loans, can be found in the following very simple explanation offered by Mr. Zhou, a junior banker at a Chinese commercial bank.

And that, in under 60 words, explains why China finds itself in a no way out situation, and why despite all its recurring posturing, all its promises for reform, all its bluster for deleveraging, China's ruling elite will never be able to achieve an internal devaluation, and why despite its recurring threats to crush, gut and destroy all the evil Yuan shorts, ultimately it will have no choice but to pursue an external devaluation of its economy by way of devaluing its currency presumably some time before its foreign reserves run out (which at a $185 billion a month burn rate may not last for even one year).

However, before it does, it will make sure that it also crushes every Yuan short, doing precisely what the Fed has done with equity shorts in the US over the past 7 years.

(ZeroHedge)