The flotation of Blackstone in June 2007 has already gone down as one of the symbolic events in America's financial bubble - the end-of-an-era deal when some of Wall Street's savviest insiders decided to cash out.

Yet the listing of the private equity group could also be the turning point in another chapter of financial history; one that will shape the world that emerges from the current crisis: the moment when China really began to question its deep financial entanglement with the US.