There are few things studied as closely by the Chinese Communist party as how to avoid the fate of its Soviet counterpart. In an internal meeting after he assumed power in 2012, President Xi Jinping said no one in the Soviet Union had been “man enough” to stand up to Mikhail Gorbachev and glasnost.

But for Mr Xi another historical event from the same era may warrant more immediate attention. It is just over 30 years since Japan began inflating a property and stock market bubble whose implosion ravaged public confidence, cowed corporations and scarred an economy for decades. China’s priority today is to avoid that fate.

It is not a new concern for Beijing. In 2010, as China’s overall indebtedness was approaching 200 per cent of gross domestic product, Mr Xi, then the country’s vice-president, asked scholars at the Central Party School to research the subject, according to two Chinese academics familiar with his request. A subsequent paper outlined some of the lessons of the Japanese bubble, including the need for Beijing to raise awareness of financial risks, safeguard “economic sovereignty” and not give in to pressure to change its currency policy.