Chinese people welcomed in the year of the rabbit this year visiting family, playing mah-jong, betting on the horses (among other things) and inspecting the latest flats for sale.

Buying property has become a national passion in China. Last week, Beijing announced further measures in its ongoing campaign to cool both demand for property and real estate prices. It raised interest rates in an effort to induce people to keep money in the banks. It adjusted the way the property price index is calculated in much the same way it earlier adjusted the consumer price index to minimise the impact of rising food prices on inflation. It told foreigners that unless they had paid taxes for a number of years in a given city, they would be unable to buy property.

In spite of these efforts, though, the betting on the mainland is that the game will continue. Virtually nobody in China thinks there is any chance of a crash in the property market, for a mix of fundamental and self-interested reasons. For one thing, there is a lot of vested interests in the government itself that have a stake in rising prices. Most local government revenue comes from land sales. If land prices fall, governments take in less money. So while Beijing announces the latest edicts in a loud voice, local governments undermine that policy in whispers.