Dama dames: China's secret weapon(2)

Suffice to say, they do not read books or publications on investment and have never heard of words like "options" or "futures". But they do have an intuitive understanding of return on investment. They prefer things they can touch and feel, so there is suspicion that they are behind China's sky-high property prices. Certainly, their demands that potential sons-in-law own real estate before tying the knot are exerting unquantifiable pressure on the market.

Since I'm already offering free advice to Fortune 500 companies about the secret of China's demographics, I'll go one step further. Chinese dama are the nicest people one can meet, the most hospitable and trustworthy. They may be housewives or have jobs that leave them with plenty of free time. They chat among themselves about pretty much everything, gaining intimate knowledge of who is making how much and who is sleeping with whom. In previous incarnations from the not-too-distant past, they would volunteer to catch cheating husbands in the community or stop premarital sex from taking place under their watch.

Nowadays, they would still love to see people hitching up and properly marrying. In one community in Zhengzhou, four dama successfully played matchmakers for 1,600 couples over four years, according to one report. And they probably did not get paid. It's all in the gung-ho spirit of showering the young with conjugal bliss.

Chinese dama did not grow up rich. They went through a period when inflation was high and the family earnings were limited. But with their children possibly away at college or out of college and their husbands still toiling away in the office or on the road, they now find themselves flush with cash and faced with a dizzying array of investment or consumption options. What they end up buying for themselves or their families will not necessarily be the same as what their peers in Western countries might take a liking to.

In recent weeks, Chinese dama have been said to be behind the roller-coaster ride of the digital currency known as bitcoin. That is certainly a new development because it defies the conventional wisdom that they prefer their wealth to be tangible.

I've been wondering how Chinese dama would respond to that 1980s UA ad. They might have said, "Yeah, I want to pamper myself with a luxury trip to the US. I deserve it and can afford it now. Besides, this lady looks just like me." If the ad featured a young model as I suggested back in Berkeley, dama might have said, "She looks like a typical trophy wife. My husband could be spending money behind my back on this kind of woman and he may even pay her to fly to the US for a vacation. Well, maybe I should buy more gold and stash it away so I'll have something to fall back on when things turn bad."