Thursday Dec 12, 2024
Thursday Dec 12, 2024
Monday, 11 January 2016 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
Global jitters continue to drag the market. Speaking to Bloomberg TV India, Rogers Holdings CEO Jim Rogers says the worst is yet to be over and there could be more correction in China. Following are excerpts:
Q: It hasn’t been a good start this year given what is happening in China. What do you think?
A: Unfortunately I am afraid we are finally paying the price that is overdue. We had seven years now with no correction in the US market anyway and we got a lot of excesses. And now we are going to pay the piper.
Q: If the correction in US market is overdue, is it going to take the rest of the world with it?
A: I am long on China and I am short on various sectors in USA. Of course China is more down today than US will be later. I am not buying China at the moment and the main reason is because, as I said before, we are well overdue. We had eight-nine years of artificial low interest rate, zero interest rate, we have had gigantic acquisitions in debt, financial market authority was wonderful, funds were going up, everything was going up and when we pay the price for something like this it goes on for a while. It won’t correct in one week and we can start all over again. It wasn’t the case for the last seven years and it can’t be the case for the next two-three years also.
Q: 2015 was pretty much a washout here as far as crude oil prices are concerned. What is your story for 2016?
A: I am afraid I am probably not a very good person to ask about crude prices as I have not done a very good job in this. Normally, when you have markets going through the roof there is much more than they show – It is greed. And then on the downside, when things are bad they go much down then they should – they generate fear. So we are now in this fear phase. I actually have no idea.
I am watching. I do expect it to be a surprise on the downside because of all the panic going on in our market right now.
There are a few bright spots like the US dollar, which happens to be my longest currency possession. People think it is safe so they are rushing to the US dollars. It is not a safe haven. But since people think it is then it can go a bit high.
Q: You are short in the US market but long on the US dollar. What will propel the dollar higher from here?
A: Janet Yellen may have the guts to do it but she is not going to get it right. She does not know what she is doing. If she cuts back on interest rates, again in panic, that is going to be bad for the world. If she raises the interest rates, which is what she should be doing, that will make the dollar go higher. It is a fact that there is panic in the air and when there is panic people look for a safe investment, not in the euro or the Japanese yen, the only thing they know to do it the US dollar.
And it is going to go too high and maybe even into a bubble because there is nothing else for people to do.
