Markets mixed, China banks face loss over 4 times that of US subprime crisis

Markets had a mixed day on Wednesdy.

The S&P 500 finished flat but the STOXX Europe 600 jumped 1.9 percent while the Nikkei 225 plunged 2.3 percent.

In oil markets, Brent crude rose 1.7 percent but US crude fell 1.8 percent.

China's markets are closed this week for the Lunar New Year celebrations, so they did not fuel any global market turmoil recently.

However, the calm out of China may not last too long. From Bloomberg:

Kyle Bass, the hedge fund manager who successfully bet against mortgages during the subprime crisis, said China’s banking system may see losses of more than four times those suffered by U.S. banks during the last crisis.

Should the Chinese banking system lose 10 percent of its assets because of nonperforming loans, the nation’s banks will see about $3.5 trillion in equity vanish...