According to a February 2012 report in Guangdong’s Southern Weekend newspaper, China’s four largest commercial banks each raked in profits of more than 300 million yuan a day in 2011. Meanwhile, the paper said, profits in China’s real economy (实体经济) had been “paper thin.” Financing has tightened for private enterprises, which does not bode well, it said, for the national economy. In the following cartoon, run by Guangdong’s Southern Weekend newspaper and posted by artist Cao Yi (曹一) to QQ.com, a banker sits comfortably in the clouds on the left, sucking all moisture up with a straw. Meanwhile, back down on the ground (to the right), the boss of a private enterprise looks longingly up toward the clouds, hoping for rain, as he holds a withering plant labeled “company profits.”
