China is The Future, Whether We Like it or Not
Geoff: Now Jim, we’ve kind of been seeing how things have been developing in China as far as the Shanghai Gold Exchange. So the question is, do you believe that China will ultimately control the price of gold? If so, when do you estimate this becoming a reality?
Jim Rogers [10] : Well probably, but China will become the largest economy in the world in the foreseeable future. It will become the most important country in the world in the foreseeable future. When that happens, they’re going to control the price of a lot of stuff, directly or indirectly. I don’t see them controlling the price of gold anytime soon, as big as they are and as important as they are, there’s just too much gold around the world for them to control it yet. But my children speak Mandarin. I moved to Asia so that my children would know Asia, and speak perfect Mandarin. China’s the future, whether we like it or not.
Jim is absolutely right, China is a place we have to understand no matter what if we are investors, traders or just citizens. China is as important as ever for many markets such as Gold, Commodities, Geopolitics => USA-World relations. Especially for traders or investors, China is a great place to study and participate in their markets. Now when the Chinese stock market is skyrocketing and is up more than 100% in a year closing at 4034 last Friday SSE Composite Index (SHA:000001) investors and traders are waking up to the fact that China is trading as a developed country with its own market which doesn’t depend so much on the price action in Europe or the USA. What better than a not so correlated market?
If North and South Korea Unite
Jim Rogers: If North and South Korea unite, Japan will be faced with a huge new competitor, much more powerful a competitor than South Korea is right now. There will be a country of seventy-five to eighty million people right on the Chinese border, with lots of cheap, disciplined labor and natural resources in the north and lots of capital, expertise, and management capabilities in the south. Such a country would run circles around Japan. The cost of doing business in Japan is high and getting higher. Among other things, the Japanese do not have a lot of cheap labor anymore.
Japan is against unification for obvious reasons. I am not sure why America is against it, other than simple inertia. For American bureaucrats, who are intellectually lethargic, characteristically slow to change their thinking, a divided Korea is a way of life. Several thousand US soldiers are stationed in South Korea — it is something of an industry, and an entire bureaucracy subsists on the industry’s continuity.
Where are the investment opportunities in North Korea? one might ask. I invest in markets, and there is no market there, so I would have to find companies, maybe Chinese or other Asian companies, that would benefit from the opening up of North Korea. I do not know of such companies right now. But North Korea is ripe for factories, hotels, restaurants, pretty much anything at this point. North Korea has nothing — no mobile phones, no Internet. Like Myanmar, the country lacks everything from the most basic goods and services to the highest technology. Yes, Myanmar has the Internet, but very little penetration. Yes, both countries have soap, but not nearly enough. Yes, both countries have electricity, but not nearly enough.
Tourism, I believe, presents investment opportunities in North Korea. There are only twenty-five million North Koreans, so there is not going to be a big boom in their traveling the world, but there is probably going to be a big boom in South Koreans visiting North Korea. There will be a staggering business in marriage, because there is a huge shortage of girls in South Korea. South Korean men can look for wives in Los Angeles or Queens, but the main source of Korean brides is going to be North Korea. The north does not suffer from the demographic problem that plagues the South.
I am dying to find a way to invest in both North Korea and Myanmar. The major changes in these two countries are among the most exciting things I see right now, looking to the future.
So we at Octafinance [11] are wondering, are you ready to go and buy some cheap farmland in The Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) just before the unification ?
We at Octafinance have found no good way to invest in Myanmar yet. The only market possibility is probably to “TRADE” Yoma Strategic Holdings Ltd (SGX:Z59), a Singapore listed diversified holding company that has all of its business in Myanmar.
By Octafinance.com [11]