We can get rid of central banks.. it has happened in the world many times

Jim Rogers is a smart investor who co-founded the Quantum Fund with George Soros in 1973. By 1983 the fund gained more than 4000 percent.

History shows the most unlikely time to invest was actually the best time to buy

The lessons of history are very, very, very clear. Pick any year in history, whatever we think is true, that year, 1900, 15 years later, it's a whole entirely different world. And we all know in 1900 how the world is, and we should be saying to ourselves, find me a weird guy. Find me a strange guy to tell me how this is going to change. 1950, 15 years later, everything we knew, everything we knew was totally wrong.

So I, at least, have learned that, that lesson of history. And perhaps that's why I'm more-- not interested, more I'm excited when I start looking at the way the world is today and what we all know. Because I know what we all know is not going to be true in 15 years, no matter what it is. And my problem is how do I figure it out. How do I figure it out? Whatever we know today, no matter what it is is not going to be true in 15 years.

I've learned over my career, not just my career, but reading about the world, the stranger it sounds, the more you should say, wait a minute. That sounds really strange. Let me look at it. Let me hear what's going on. Because I have certainly learned that over my life, not just my life. You read history. You read anything. As I said before, the lesson of history is that most people don't learn the lesson of history. They ignore the lesson of history. Now, we all know that if we'd invested in China 1981, we'd be the richest people in the room right now. And yet, in 1981, including me, we would have said what's wrong with you? Don't you know about Mao Zedong? Doesn't he know about the Great Leap Forward? Doesn't he know about all this stuff, what "Chinese" is?

Or Japan: Don't you know about the disaster of what this country was? If you'd said Japan, don't you know about Hiroshima? The atomic bomb? You don't know about the dictator, the emperor? How could you  invest there? They're little, bitty yellow people who must be dishonest and cruel. But those are the lessons of history. 

Why you might want to short the US

You have to be short and most markets are already down. There are very few markets that aren't down already in the world, except the averages in New York. Now, you can certainly short Europe, because it's going to get worse. You can certainly short the UK, because it's going to get worse. 

But the things that are still high, I'm sure your parents taught you to buy low and sell high. Well, the things that are high still happen to be the US, more than anything else....  You should be short the US. That's the market that's still the highest. It hasn't gone down yet. One can have shorts in any place you want, but the Japanese market is down 70%, 75% from its all-time. The Russian market -  who wants to short Russia? I'm long Russia. I mean, where are you going to short? Everything's collapsed. I'm not buying India. There was a recent remarkable development in India, but it's not enough to make me buy India. 


Jim Rogers is a smart investor who co-founded the Quantum Fund with George Soros in 1973. By 1983 the fund gained more than 4000 percent.

Timing the markets is not easy

I'm a hopeless trader, fortunately, I'm not going to worry about margin calls, because I'm not rushing out and buying a lot of sugar on 5% margin or something. There was a time in my life when I did that, but that was a long, long time ago. 

Now I'm doing other things. I'm the single worst market timer in the world. I'm the worst trader. I know that about myself. I've learned it over the years that when I say, now's the time, I should wait another year or two. The problem is I do. I wait another year or two and I should wait another year or two, because I'm so hopeless and so early at most things. But fortunately, as I say, I'm not so leveraged or in such margin that I have to worry about most things.

Russians want to cut oil production

The Saudis have made it clear they don’t want to cut production and they are right, in my view. I am not Saudi Arabian so I can’t tell them what to do. 

The Russians want to cut production, that’s not what I would do. I would let the market play itself out. It is taking a while but the high cost producers are closing down and going out of business. You are forcing the high cost exploration to stop. There is no exploration. Exploration budgets are cut by ninety percent. This eventually means no oil supply, and the price goes through the roof again. Why would you sell your oil down at these prices if you could wait and sell it later?

How bear markets start

The way bear markets work is something happens. It's a shock. People get over it. Then something else, and you know. In 2007, Iceland went bankrupt.  Iceland? Who's Iceland? What do you-- who cares? Then Ireland went bankrupt and the next thing you know, Lehman's going bankrupt. But that's the way these things always work. They start on an outlier, a marginal company, marginal country, and then it leads, and then everybody says, oh, well, we knew that. We knew it was a bear market coming. Well, they usually don't. They shake it off until it's too late.

US Dollar goes up during turmoils because people think its a safe haven

I'm not the only person who knows there's turmoil coming. And people are looking for ways to protect themselves.

I own a lot of US dollars, though. Not because it's a safe haven, but because people think it's a safe haven. And when the world falls apart, people will put their money into the dollar. That's going to mean the dollar's going to go up. 

So that means a lot of currencies will go down, including the Chinese currency, including the European currency, the British currency. Many other currencies will go down. The dollar is going to get overpriced, and the dollar might even turn into a bubble, depending on how bad the turmoil is. If there's no place to go-- at the moment, people are also going into the Swiss franc and the Japanese yen. 

Jim Rogers owns plenty of Gold and US Dollars but not buying more at the moment

There have been times in the past when the dollar and gold have gone up together. So it can happen and it will happen. People looking for a safe haven. They think the US dollar's a safe haven. They don't know what else. They think gold is a safe haven. 

Therefore neither are a safe-- nothing is a safe haven. But that's what's going on. I'm not the only person who knows there's turmoil coming. And people are looking for ways to protect themselves. I am not buying gold at the moment. I'm not buying dollars, either, but I own plenty of both.

Precious metals and US dollar could offer some protection

Turmoil has already started. It may not be dramatic yet, but it is certainly happening and a lot of people are losing money. So it is happening now but over the past couple of years, you should be very worried.

Currencies
Today if I had to do one of the other, I should buy US dollars. If you look around the world, the Japanese Yen, the Euro, the Rouble. Nobody wants these other currencies.... the Australian dollar, the Canadian dollar. People are very worried about all of these other currencies, which is the reason the main thing people would buy is the US dollar, because they think it is a safe haven.

US Dollar Bubble
It is not a bubble now, but it may very well turn into a bubble. No no.... But it may very well turn into a bubble. In 2018 it would turn into a bubble, and if it happens that way, I hope I would be smart enough to sell my US dollars.

China has said they will let people go bankrupt instead of bailing them out

China is going to have problems too. It's just the way the world works. In 2008, when the world fell apart, China had a lot money saved for a rainy day, and they started spending it when it started raining. This time, China has a lot of debt themselves. It's amazing how much debt has built up in China in just a few years. And so this time, while China's in better shape, or less bad shape than most of us, China's got a lot of debt, and they're not going to be able to help us like they did before.

Beijing has said we're going to let people go bankrupt, which I hope they do. They don't do that in the West. The red Chinese, the communist Chinese are going to let people go bankrupt, because they're good capitalists. Americans won't let anybody-- and the Europeans won't let anybody go bankrupt so they can save the world.

But China has said they will let people go bankrupt. It'll be a shock for the people who go bankrupt. It'll be a shock for the world. But it will certainly be good for China, and for the world, if they do let mistakes get cleaned up. But it will mean that they will not be able to save us as much as they did before. So the next time the world comes to an end, it's going to be a bigger shock than we expect.

Russian government bonds returning great yields

My three shareholdings are all making all-time highs. I own shares of Aeroflot, going through the roof. Moscow Stock Exchange, going through the roof. PhosAgro, big fertilizer. I'm a director. Big fertilizer. Making all-time highs. I mean, how can this be? A country which is a disaster, which everybody hates.

I own Russian government bonds in rubles. The yields are astonishing. And as long as the ruble doesn't collapse or disappear, which it's not doing, at least not at the moment. The yields are beyond comprehension. If I could just have those yields for the rest of my life, I'd be in hog heaven.

North Korea is today what China was 25 years ago

If we all bought North Korean currency, we'd all be rich someday. 

Well, North Korea today is where China was in 1981. Deng Xiaoping started opening up in '78. Most of us, including me, either weren't aware of it or if we were aware of it. We ignored it, didn't pay any attention. North Korea is doing that now. 

There are 15 free trade zones there now. You can take bicycle tours of North Korea, if you want. You can take movie tours. I'm sure if [Kim Jong Un's] father were alive, he'd hang him. If his grandfather were alive, he'd torture him and then hang him, you know, for some of the things he's doing. I mean, you go to North Korea now, you see these astonishing restaurants with white tablecloths, cutlery, candles. I mean, this is North Korea we're talking about. Chefs. It's happening.

China and Russia investing in North Korea

They're going to be the richest people in China, because they're starting banks, and everything else in North Korea, and you and I just sit and look and say, 'Buy me a Champagne someday.'