What changes did this tracking compare?

  • Citi extracted Chinese property stocks from its global quantitative positioning report to examine changes in positioning over the week and month through 27 October 2026, and displayed discounts to net asset value, price-to-earnings ratios and sector valuations.
  • The positioning charts compare the latest week with the preceding week and the latest month with the preceding month. The supplied chart text contains no specific figures, so it is not possible to determine which stocks are more crowded, how positioning has changed, or where valuations stand.

How is the crowdedness score calculated?

  • Citi first ranks each of five indicators by percentile within a broad equity universe in each region, then combines them with equal weights into an individual stock's crowdedness score; data must be available for at least four indicators to calculate it.
  • A higher composite ranking indicates greater crowdedness relative to the equity universe in the same region. This is a relative comparison across stocks; the score alone does not directly reveal the direction of changes in positioning.

Which signals can increase crowdedness?

  • The five indicators include the most crowded quantitative factors, historical relative valuation, short interest, market sentiment and macroeconomic risk exposure. Historical valuation combines price-to-book and next-fiscal-year price-to-earnings ratios; a higher valuation score contributes more to crowdedness.
  • Citi's short-interest measure is the ratio of short positions to available inventory. The lower the ratio, the stronger the trading consensus the model assumes. The sentiment indicator combines analyst ratings and company news sentiment: a greater concentration of buy ratings and stronger positive news sentiment may increase crowdedness; the indicator requires at least three analyst recommendations.
  • Macroeconomic risk exposure measures the contribution of macroeconomic factors to an individual stock's risk, and higher exposure may also result in similar positioning. The composite score therefore reflects a combination of signals, rather than a single measure of holdings.