No, not the big hairy guys, the economists who are pessimistic on the economic future in one way or another. Since the world seems to have avoided an economic catastrophe and things are starting to shape up again, I thought it would be a good time to check in on what some of the bears are now saying, now that we dodged the bullet. Are they changing their tune? Well, yes many of them have changed their tune.
Ok, but what about some of the guys who still are bears? I checked a little on the internet to see, confining it to a few well known guys.
Roubini (Dr. Doom) is no longer really technically a bear, however he sees a 25% chance of a double dip recession. Also he sees risks for the dollar:
http://video.forbes.com/fvn/business/roubini-is-the-dollar-safe
Next we have Jim Rogers. He’s pretty pessimistic about America and the dollar. He says the dollar will fall soon and that commodities are still a good investment. He likes Asia. Here’s a few recent comments of his:
http://jimrogers-investments.blogspot.com/
Then there’s Marc Faber. He’s the most pessimistic of all. He predicted the market crash and the recent 6 month run that just occurred. He sees a couple years of good growth for the stock market, followed in five years or so by huge inflation and the total collapse of the dollar and the American standard of living causing the majority of the population to fall into abject poverty, because “nothing has been solved”. He says to get into equities, because the dollar will continue to gradually lose its value. According to him, the current decline of the dollar is for one reason: it is a symptom of inflation. It is inflation that is already occurring now, but if you buy equities, you avoid the downward trajectory of the value of money during this inflationary period:
These guys are all pretty smart, but in the minority among economists. Well, obviously – I mean to claim the total collapse of the world economy gets us into kooky Mad Max territory. I sure hope they are wrong. But just in case, I am going to stock up on guns and ammo and build me an underground hideout in the backyard. Sweet dreams.
September 29, 2009 at 7:32 pm |
Jim Rogers is a bag (an old bag) of hot air. Now that he’s moved his life to Asia he spends all his time trying to convince people it wasn’t a mistake.