It’s kind of like a monetary or
economic triage; I’m always looking around the world to see which
countries are in the least bad shape, which countries are the least
reckless and the least irresponsible. You really can’t find any one
country that’s doing it perfectly. You just have to find the ones that
are making the fewest mistakes.
And I think high on that list are
Singapore and Hong Kong. Those markets are relatively free of
regulation, free of taxation. I mean, it’s not nonexistent, but on a
relative basis you have a lot more freedom there, and so you have a lot
more prosperity there. You have much better economic fundamentals. And
not just in those two places, but in Southeast Asia in general, in a lot
of the emerging economies, you’ll find a lot less government and a lot
more freedom. People are working harder, they’re saving, they’re
producing, and they’re exporting. You don’t have these trade deficits,
budget deficits, and you don’t have armies of people looking to retire
on government entitlements. In Europe, we still like Switzerland even
though they are making mistakes tying their currency to the euro. I
think eventually they will change that policy. Scandinavia, we have been
investors in Norway, we’ve been investors in Sweden. Also Australia and
New Zealand have been longtime favorites. We’ve been investing down
there or even closer to home in Canada. We do have some investments in
South America. We’re diversifying around the world trying to get into
the right countries, the right currencies, the right asset classes.
- Peter Schiff (CEO of Euro Pacific Capital)
