Young Chinese in the red as easy credit spurs debt

Beijing

WHEN Wu Qi and her husband traded in their Mazda 3 for a more expensive Mercedes Benz sedan, they applied for a 200,000 yuan (S$40,300) bank loan to help pay for it. They got the money within minutes.

Quick and easy access to credit has encouraged many young Chinese to go into the red to buy cars and apartments they could not otherwise afford.

They are the faces of China's growing addiction to debt, which along with government and corporate borrowing, has raised fe…