Asian Airlines vs Catering business

I am not keen to own Singapore Airlines or Cathay Pacific Airways because they have a lot of competition from budget airlines. But I like some airline-servicing companies based in Singapore, including SATS [SATS.Singapore], in the catering business, and SIA Engineering [SIE.Singapore], which overhauls aircraft. They have subsidiaries in many Asian countries. The stocks yield around 4%. They aren't supercheap, and the Asian markets generally aren't cheap enough for me. But longer term, if you want to park money in Asia, both companies will do well.


Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Marc Faber : Emerging Economies Will Submerge Soon, Gold Demand to Follow

Marc Faber is interviewed by Sprott where he discusses his forecast for emerging economies and how he see's gold moving higher in the future.




Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Dr. Faber on Government Statistics

Governments will always publish the statistics that they wish to show irrespective whether that is in China or in other countries.
Governments control basically the statistical offices, so they can show whatever they want.
As Stalin said, it's not important who votes but who counts the votes. And the government counts the statistics.


Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Marc Faber: Mr Putin is correct

Mr. Putin did the right thing from his perspective. We have to look - put ourselves into his shoes. He did absolutely the right thing at the right time. By that I mean that there was interference by foreign powers in Ukrainian politics that were unfavorably from the perspective of Russia.
The Crimea is strategically most important for Russia. It has practically no meaning strategically to the United States or to Europe. But for Russia it's very important.
I don't think that Russia will move further into Ukraine unless there is serious provocation. But I doubt it will happen. But I think the wider implication is that we have now border lines. In other words, the US would intervene if a foreign power would establish bases in Haiti and in Cuba and so forth and so on, and the Chinese will react if foreign powers threaten Chinese access to resources.
This is very important because the occupation or say the referendum in Crimea and Crimea moving to Russia gives essentially a signal to China that one day they can also move and seize some territory that they perceive that belongs to them.
  -  via Bloomberg



Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

These Long Bull Markets End Badly

The long-running bull market in U.S. stocks runs the risk of ending badly, and that's why perennial contrarian Marc Faber warned investors Tuesday to stay away.

"In the U.S., it's probably too late to buy," the publisher of "The Gloom, Boom & Doom Report" told CNBC.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 Index are coming off their first two-week winning streaks of 2014, and their best single week of gains of the year.

Faber said that stocks have been going strong for five years. "And by the end of March, we will be in the second-longest bull market for the last eight years," he added in a "Squawk Box" interview.

"Usually these long bull markets, they end badly," he said, pointing to the 1987 crash and the significant declines in 2000 and 2007.

"So I don't think it's a very opportune time to buy [U.S.] equities," Faber added.

While it might be too early to buy some of the beaten-down emerging markets at these levels, investors can make money in the longer-term, he said.

"I think I can make the case that over the next five to 10 years, I will make more money by buying now in the emerging economies then in the U.S.," Faber said.
- Source, CNBC:



Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Marc Faber on China vs Europe growth

Even if China grows by only 3% or 4%, it is better than Europe. People are moving up the economic ladder in Asia and into the middle class.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Asians take more Risks Than The Swiss

I went to a high class school in Switzerland. Not that we were rich, but in the class there were several very well-to-do Swiss family members. Of the children of these families, most have no more money. 

One still has a lot of money because his grandmother was studying in Paris in her youth and took a liking to the 1910-1920s impressionists. So they have Van Goghs and Renoirs and Matisses — even in the bathroom they have so many of them. The appreciation in value of these paintings was fantastic.

Another one is well-to-do because he inherited money from an uncle of his. So it’s funny that entrepreneurial families that were – at that time — either in construction or the textile industry, are essentially all gone. The largest wealth of my school friends came from inheritances.

I liked Asia when I first came there in 1973. I went to Hong Kong because people were very entrepreneurial and risk takers. They like to gamble and they’re not afraid. In Switzerland everybody is always afraid of losing money. 

In Asia, they take risks and some of the entrepreneurs have become immensely rich — immensely rich starting from zero. These are people that were frugal with themselves. They worked very hard and they also benefited from asset inflation. In Hong Kong, property prices went ballistic over the last 30, 40 years. So anyone who owned properties became very rich.


Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Good management is management that can adapt to change

I think in every company, you want management that is skillful, that has talent, and preferably that has their interests aligned with yours as a shareholder. In other words, ideally, they own a lot of shares in the company you invest in.

Good management is management that can adapt to change. That is key because when I started to work on Wall Street, the favorite stocks among institutional investors were companies like Sears, JC Penney, Kodak, Xerox, Polaroid, and so forth. Most of these companies have disappeared because management was not able to adjust to the changes in the world.

There was at the time an analyst who followed the photographic industry, in particular Polaroid and Kodak. On the periphery she followed Fuji photo film as well.

Her projections depended on how many people in the world would buy a Polaroid camera over the years, how many pictures the world would take with Kodak cameras, and how much film Kodak would eventually sell.

Eventually, her projections were all surpassed—just not with Kodak film and Polaroid cameras. But with mobile phones that were taking pictures electronically. Nowadays, you see every idiot taking pictures all the time to put on Facebook, or to look at him or herself (nobody is interested in these pictures except themselves!) but it didn’t benefit Kodak and Polaroid.
That is why I always am skeptical about these studies.


 Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

I would rather address the water problem – with proper water distribution and irrigation

I suppose there is a lot of risk; but if you want to aid development, if you want to improve the standard of living of people, water would be a good place to start. I would rather address the water problem – with proper water distribution and irrigation — than to give these countries vaccines and gifts.


Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Buy low Sell High

Well basically, we had a huge run-up in prices starting in 1999, from $255 oz. to $1921 oz. in early September 2011. We’ve been in a correction period since.
Now, I think the correction period was partly justified because there was too much enthusiasm and too much speculation, leading to the peak in September 2011.

But I think that there may have been some market manipulation as well. My sense is that the correction has probably come to an end. If anything, the fundamentals for gold are much better today than they were at the time of the peak, but the price is down.

Every investor understands “buy low and sell high” as a principle, but when prices are low, nobody wants to buy. We had very negative sentiment recently.

Of course, we could one day enter a long-term downtrend after the long period of growth and asset inflation over the last 20 to 30 years.

But when I compare gold to the S&P, the S&P is up substantially since 2011 and gold is down substantially. If you compare the performance of gold shares to the S&P, it has been a disaster for gold shares.

When I look around at asset prices; real estate, bonds, equities, paintings, collectibles, vintage cars, I think the price of gold is actually one of the few assets that are relatively cheap, relatively inexpensive now.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Asian conflict partly due to US military bases

My view is this: we wouldn’t have a conflict in Asia if not for the intervention by the U.S. The U.S. has a security pact with Japan and has military bases and naval basis all over Asia.

The Chinese economy is highly vulnerable to interruptions in the supply of metals and of oil. 47% of global metals consumption is from China. It’s up from 4% in 1990 and 10% in the year 2000. So they have become a huge factor.

For their industrial production, they need resources; they need iron ore from Australia, copper from Australia and elsewhere, and oil from the Middle East. That’s their only source of oil — the Middle East –, compared to say the U.S. that can source oil from Canada, from Mexico and who have a rising domestic production.

So the Chinese are very concerned about interruptions of supplies; I think that over time, the Chinese will want to control the East and South China Sea. I do not think that they have any plans for aggression, but the U.S. wouldn’t be particularly happy either if, say, the Chinese or the Russians had military bases in the Caribbean, in Mexico, in Canada and so forth.

The Chinese cannot accept to be encircled by U.S. military bases in Central Asia, South East Asia, and North Asia. I think those tensions will increase over time.




Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Social unrest comes from money printing

I am of course completely against the money printing that the central banks do. They basically only enrich people that own assets. For people that don’t own assets, their wealth or their standards of living go down. This creates growing wealth and income inequality that leads to social unrest or geopolitical problems.




Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Healthy Bull Markets need decent Corrections

These types of bull markets without a correction usually lead to more than just a correction. Just in the last six months there has been euphoria for U.S. equities.
My view is that it's not a good time to buy U.S. equities. It's a better time to get out of stocks than into stocks.


Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

This long-running bull market in U.S. stocks runs the risk of ending badly

Usually These Long Bull Markets End Badly
The long-running bull market in U.S. stocks runs the risk of ending badly, and that's why perennial contrarian Marc Faber warned investors Tuesday to stay away.

"In the U.S., it's probably too late to buy," the publisher of "The Gloom, Boom & Doom Report" told CNBC.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 Index are coming off their first two-week winning streaks of 2014, and their best single week of gains of the year.

Faber said that stocks have been going strong for five years. "And by the end of March, we will be in the second-longest bull market for the last eight years," he added in a "Squawk Box" interview.

"Usually these long bull markets, they end badly," he said, pointing to the 1987 crash and the significant declines in 2000 and 2007.

"So I don't think it's a very opportune time to buy [U.S.] equities," Faber added.

While it might be too early to buy some of the beaten-down emerging markets at these levels, investors can make money in the longer-term, he said.

"I think I can make the case that over the next five to 10 years, I will make more money by buying now in the emerging economies then in the U.S.," Faber said.

- in CNBC:





Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

This bull market has gone for very far

 This is the second longest bull market in the last 100 years. These are all signs of a top, so I wouldn’t buy shares here. I’m not interested.
Can the market go up another 20 percent? Perhaps.

I wasn’t interested in buying the Nasdaq in late 1999, but between January and March 2000, the NASDAQ went up another 30%. Of course, people were crying shortly thereafter when they realized their losses.

So, the markets go up and down. I think that the upside potential for most stocks is very limited now and there is considerable downside risk. Probably more downside risk than investors realize.

 Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Learn from successful companies

I advise my younger readers who come out of school or university to first work in a successful company in order to learn the ins-and-out of an industry. And while working for a company, it is important to make the best out of it either by joining or by forming a “fake family.” Some of your colleagues will be close friends for life even if you work somewhere else, while others will become your customers or will be in a position to help you in many different ways (the Goldman Sachs people seem to be very good in this respect).
In fact, whereas my life improved after starting my own business (although I worked harder than when I was an employee), the one and only thing that I occasionally miss working on my own is the daily interaction with colleagues or as Kellaway puts it, working and living within a “fake family.”
Another point I wish to make about corporate life is this: Corporate life is usually not particularly pleasant. But since most people will work all their lives as employees of companies and therefore, spend more time at work than at home, they can greatly improve their working lives (and their performance) by having a cordial relationship with their colleagues and superiors.
Personally, I actually believe that most people have a better relationship with their co-workers (their fake families) than with their spouses at home.


Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

I always had a close relationship with my co-workers

A I was fortunate because I always had a close relationship with my co-workers, and all my superiors were always most courteous toward me, my wife and my daughter. In fact, they always went out of their way to support and help me. This, despite the fact, that I was probably their most “difficult” employee. But my bosses took my unpleasant character in stride and told me smilingly that if I were not “difficult,” they would not have hired me in the first place. - via www.gloomboomdoom.com



Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Ha Noi-Hai Duong Beer, FPT and Vietnam Dairy

My favorite investment is Ha Noi-Hai Duong Beer [HAD.Vietnam], a local brewery. FPT [FPT.Vietnam], an information-technology company that sells mobile phones, Internet services, and software, is another pick. It is a technology conglomerate with more value than its share price reflects.

Vietnam Dairy Products [VNM.Vietnam] is a Vietnamese blue chip. It has been growing around 30% a year, and can continue to grow by about 20% a year. The stock hasn't been acting well lately, but the company has a big market in Vietnam and will do well long term.

Asian consumer companies aren't cheap anymore, but in time, multinational consumer companies will want to acquire them because they have distribution in the region. A basket of Vietnamese shares could be attractive.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Need to be selective investing in Asian stocks

In dollar terms, the Indian market is still down about 40% from the peak, because the currency has weakened. In the 1970s, stock market indexes performed poorly and stock-picking came to the fore. Asia could be like that now. It is a huge region, and you have to invest by company. Some Indian companies will do well, and others poorly. Some people made 40% on their investments in China last year, but the benchmark index did poorly.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

A Vicious Circle To The Downside Is Just Beginning

"It's not just tapering that is putting pressure on markets," Marc Faber warns in thie brief clip. "Emerging economies have practically no growth and we have a slowdown in China that is more meaningful than strategists are willing to believe," he adds and this is "causing a vicious circle to the downside" in inflated asset markets as most of the growth in the world over the last five years has come from emerging markets. Faber suggests Treasuries as a safe haven in the short-term; but is nervous of their value in the long-term as "debt is becoming burdensome on the system." "A lot of economic growth was driven by soaring asset prices"


Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

More Europeans may choose to live in Singapore

The outlook for property in Asia isn't bad because a lot of Europeans realize they will need to leave Europe for tax reasons. They can live in Singapore and be taxed at a much lower rate.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Marc Faber Market update March 2014

I do own some long-term Treasuries because I believe that owning them is an inexpensive and relatively low risk strategy for shorting the stock market. 

However, since the beginning of the year, both long-term Treasuries and most commodities rebounded strongly. Long-term Treasuries are up 5%, gold is up 12%, and the Junior Gold Mining Index (GDXJ) is up 52% from the late December 2013 low. 

Also, as I explained in previous reports, I would reduce my US equities positions altogether because valuations (and profit margins) are stretched.

via - GloomBoomDoom.com

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Marc Faber Market Commentary March 2014

In early January 2014 I opined that, “It might seem to my readers counter-intuitive to have a position in 10-year Treasuries, and at the same time to believe that commodity prices could rebound.”
However, since the beginning of the year, both long-term Treasuries and most commodities rebounded strongly. Long-term Treasuries are up 5%, gold is up 12%, and the Junior Gold Mining Index (GDXJ) is up 52% from the late December 2013 low.
Also, as I explained in previous reports, I would reduce my US equities positions altogether because valuations (and profit margins) are stretched.
I do own some long-term Treasuries because I believe that owning them is an inexpensive and relatively low risk strategy for shorting the stock market.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Rapidly Escalating Household Debt

Faber warned of the risks of the present global credit bubble and said another slowdown could follow on the back of rising consumer debt levels – which had previously helped to create growth.

"Total credit as a percent of the global economy is now 30 percent higher than it was at the start of the economic crisis in 2007, we have had rapidly escalating household debt, especially in emerging economies and resource economies like Canada and Australia and we have come to a point where household debt has become burdensome on the system—that is, where an economic slowdown follows."



Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Hutchison Port Holdings Trust

If you have a negative view of the world, and you think trade will contract, property prices will fall, and the yield on the 10-year Treasury will drop, a REIT like Hutchison is a relatively attractive investment. 

Hutchison Port Holdings Trust [HPHT.Singapore] yields about 7%. It owns several ports in Hong Kong and China.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.