abitare (99.42)

Call me a "bear". I have been called worse by nicer people then you!

October 24, 2007 – Comments (3)

Why a bear? 

“I'm in the process of -- I hope in the next few months -- getting all of my assets out of the dollar,” Jim Rogers told Bloomberg yesterday. “I'm that pessimistic about what's happening in the U.S.''

The yuan is “the best currency to buy right now,” Rogers said. “I don't see how one can really lose on the renminbi in the next decade or so. It's gotta go. It's gotta triple. It's gotta quadruple.”

The dollar is just about the worst performing currency this year. Of the 16 actively traded currencies, only the Mexican peso has fared worse in 2007.

“It's the official policy of the central bank and the U.S. to debase the currency,'' said Rogers, “The U.S. dollar is and has been the world's reserve currency, the world's medium of exchange… That's in the process of changing. “The pound sterling, which used to be the world's reserve currency, lost 80% of its value, top to bottom, as it went through the whole period of losing its status as the world's reserve currency.''

  “I think the credit situation is worse than anybody realizes,” said Julian Robertson on CNBC.

Robertson’s a bit of a legend. In 1980, he started his Tiger Management fund with $8 million… and grew it 875 fold into $7 billion over the next 16 years. He then closed it when he ceased to understand valuations on Wall Street during the tech boom… and bust.

Now he’s sounding the alarm for the economy at large. “I think we’re going to have a doozy of a recession,” he predicted. “The Federal Reserve and our government will trash the dollar until such times as there is some turnaround in the economy or until they realize that this policy is self-defeating.”

You can watch the whole Robertson interview here.