Luca

China follows basic economic research by OECD policy advise to generate MORE growth for their overall economy but LESS growth for monopolies and concentrated markets. But nobody wants any redistribution in the US and both republic. and democr. basically run the same elite clientele political program, ruin the power of labor, don't regulate monopolies and concentrated markets, sell essential infrastructure to private companies that charge a lot and make their donors rich. Fair enough! Then China engages in the opposite policies which makes them stronger, their businesses stronger and the West and their elite hate it of course. For the average labor worker, this should not be of any concern but the media sector manipulates everybody to believe this is their concern too although it again only affects less than 5% of the population. They can hit china with as much tariffs as they want but they will cut their life supply off since they factories are not in their home countries. Yes, maybe they can reestablish colonies in India or other SEA countries and maybe they will obey the US and don't develop themselves so that's maybe a bet. Still, China is already far enough to be self-sufficient in their own country and their partners are also very wealthy with resources. Russia did the right move, nothing to gain with Europe and US, better focus on China. It will be interesting how India will behave, the best would be to stay very neutral and take the best of both worlds while driving their own high-quality development. Very interesting times, Xi is right to say that there are changes happening not seen in 100 years: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/3/22/xi-tells-putin-of-changes-not-seen-for-100

https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/social-issues-migration-health/trends-in-income-inequality-and-its-impact-on-economic-growth_5jxrjncwxv6j-en It follows that policies to reduce income inequalities should not only be pursued to improve social outcomes but also to sustain long-term growth. Redistribution policies via taxes and transfers are a key tool to ensure the benefits of growth are more broadly distributed and the results suggest they need not be expected to undermine growth. But it is also important to promote equality of opportunity in access to and quality of education. This implies a focus on families with children and youths – as this is when decisions about human capital accumulation are made -- promoting employment for disadvantaged groups through active labour market policies, childcare supports and in-work benefits.

A philosopher king leader party who enables superb outcomes is IMO preferred compared to a flawed democracy that enables inferior outcomes. Outcomes matter the most, not the process towards the outcomes. Also, democracies run into the threat of becoming capital oligarchies as can be seen in the west, the government is sold to the highest bidder with the deepest pockets and the economy stalls in benefit to the very wealthy. This is an edge the CCP has and why the West is so afraid of them. China will and does have a more competitive and more efficient industrial system, that can produce products for cheaper because public infrastructure is not privatized and monopolized by the financial sector but belongs to the government, banks, energy etc. They are turning more towards SOE owned key infrastructure because they see that the financial sector just wants to monopolize these assets which makes them a lot of money but labor suffers making the overall economy less efficient. Musk said it already, China is a powerhouse next level and nobody can beat them, energy will be a lot cheaper, factories are all next to each other, short supply chains, huge talent pool etc. So who will be happier, the person living in an almost fully automated, highly technological very wealthy society that cares about lifting everybody up in the "navel of the earth" or the highly privatized deindustrialized society that belongs to the financial, insurance and real estate sector that owns the government and monopolies stalling overall growth and development?

https://www.scmp.com/business/china-business/article/3258812/chinas-stock-market-beijing-issues-unprecedented-guidelines-calling-transparency-risk-management?module=top_story&pgtype=homepage China has issued an unprecedented set of policy guidelines to push for transparency, security, risk-management and vibrancy in the country’s US$9 trillion stock market, sketching out a view of what the world’s second-largest capital market could look like by the middle of the century as Beijing solidifies its goal of becoming a financial superpower. The document released by the State Council after the markets closed on Friday evening sets out nine guidelines that formulate a framework to develop the market, demanding a better mechanism for protecting investors’ interests and an improvement in the quality of listed companies over the next five years. By 2035, the market should have achieved “a reasonable structure of investing and fundraising” in which listed companies will have demonstrated a significant improvement in quality, it said. There must also be demonstrable progress in cultivating first-class investment banks and financial institutions. The push highlights the fact China’s state support for its stock market has entered a new stage, with some of the supportive measures proposed by the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) now being written into the State Council’s documents. It is rare for China’s cabinet to issue documents directly targeting the stock market, with the two previous such occasions occurring in 2004 and 2014, both preceding a raging bull market. Friday’s guidelines complement four documents issued last month by the CSRC pledging to crack down on fraudulent listings, raise the threshold for new listings and require publicly traded companies to return more to investors through buy-backs and dividend payouts. According to the document published today, companies will be required to disclose their dividend payout policies when they list, and stricter rules on information disclosure and corporate governance will be implemented to restrict stake reductions by major shareholders and push listed companies to boost investment value. The regulators will also work out standards for abnormal trading and manipulation, issue rules to strengthen the supervision of high-frequency transactions, and mete out severe punishments in cases of malicious manipulation and short-selling, it said. The document also called for the fast-track approval of exchange-traded funds, the expansion of index-based funds, and a higher proportion of stock-focused funds in the mutual fund industry.

The total amount invested in India is also quite significant to the market cap, Watsa was bullish...likely a lot of great things to come in the future too...

Great stuff...

Great AGM, listened to everything

Haha! NTDOY and JOE are certainly good candidates.

Honestly thats a really solid deal. And yeah, MC D got way to expensive...

Just imagine what's gonna happen to prices and the supply chain when the war with China gets hotter...geopolitical conflicts may have further supply chain shocks and inflation surprises down the road...the energy transition is also not really pushing prices down...the fight against oil...coal...at the same time rents just go up up up so wages have to go up up up...I feel very comfy sitting on a lot of Fairfax Shares...

Wasnt Munger always fascinated about China and their work ethic, fascinated by BYD too...fascinated by Li Lu, had large portions of family wealth invested in Asia and bought a LOT of Baba for his own family besides for DJCO...

Lol! I am 100% european, family coming from northern Germany, also great grandparents etc. no family history in China/Asia

That is nothing new, we all know that and I said Shareholders are No.1 in the US. I still think you wont get fked over as Munger said.

I am coming from the cosmopolitan country Germany haha! I'd say I can look with reasonable neutrality to both the US and China from this place.

And also dont get me wrong, i dont hate the US. I think the US can be a GREAT place and has SO much to like. Culturally, nature, many great people too, great history, very advanced economy, etc. But China is discounted so much and you can find problems in both countries. US tech is also very strong but also very expensive. Munger is right, we can all do well, Chinese, and US...and we should have a lot of free trade together...

It is no surprise to me that real problems in the US but also the west are overlooked and instead we are focussing on fake problems like all these transrights, women rights whatever rights which do what? Will we be happier when finally trans people can work 80 hours a week or 1 out of 1m transpeople plays a role in a disney movie? Its a fake public debate, a false flag operation to divert peoples attentions from real problems which nobody wants to solve. At least the SP 500 is at 5200 basis points...and 0.1% can go to an ivy league school while the rest either has to go in debt for private schools or live with the low quality public schools...the majority of Americans is NOT doing well. And China is the problem...and always bet on America! Long China honestly.

So how will the economy look like who regulates the bad things and how will the economy look like who doesn't? The picture is plain in sight, 70% of people overweight or obese, teens spending 5-8 hours on their phone everyday, 20% of adults diagnosed with depression in their lifetime, 10% with depression within a year, one in six people on psychiatric drugs for what reason? Because US is the greatest place on earth and everybody does better than all other countries? How many people come on top due to other drug abuse? Alcohol? But yes, we need way more free markets because that will do what?

How many hours do US teens spend on their phone everyday watching junk reels, playing games etc? If you look at some statistics, its horrific how many hours it is. But China is the bad guy to regulate that and their technology companies? How many people in the US are underpaid and work 2 Jobs to survive? Why is China the bad guy for common prosperity? The price hikes in food, other consumer products etc are also one example of too concentrated markets and too little competition, why do i have to pay 20 dollars for a junk burger meal? Why do i need to pay too much for cars when china now makes them better, cheaper and is even willing to send them to my front porch? But they are not allowed to do that...i wonder why that is...

I did tell you exactly what the differences are. Shareholders are place number 1 in the US, understood? Thats a clear difference I pointed out. But I also told you that that doesn't necessarily mean good things for the overall economy, people's well-being, achieving a higher level of civilization, etc. 70% of people in the US are overweight or obese. But nobody regulates or does anything. There are many more examples of this.

This economist has a point and Xi starts a common prosperity program-->Market--> CHINA BAD

I cant believe that you are convinced of "separation of powers" within the US. Reality is that the US is completely dominated by business interests and the pendulum is way reversed compared to china. Yes, that's good for shareholders but the US consumer isn't looking particularly bright either where 45% earn below 29k USD a month and concentrated markets with lacking competition will bring their own ills to an economy over time.

I disagree, if you look at what Li Qian recently said, its exactly these talking points. They are aware of the problem and obviously working on it. So many people make China look like its this "nothing can change its over" economy while they regularly publish writings that tackle all of the critical points...its a very dynamic economy as you can see by the past 20 years of success. Your article says: Xu highlights the profoundly obstructed channel of income transfer from the corporate to the household sector as the primary reason behind this distinctive consumption pattern. The extensive presence of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in China, whose profits and dividends primarily flow to the state rather than households, diminishes the wealth effect that might otherwise stimulate household consumption. Nor is the highly concentrated ownership of many Chinese private enterprises doing much to increase the wealth or consumption of the wider population. I don't see why people working at SOEs couldn't get an income increase ordered by the government which will boost consumption. They did the same at JD where wages was forced up, which is smart. Privately owned enterprise need to pay their workers more so consumption increases, the CCP already regulates it quite heavily: https://www.reuters.com/technology/jdcom-cut-senior-executives-salaries-by-10-20-2022-11-22/ Ironically THATS then seen as "BAD" by the market. While they do exactly what is good for the overall economy. Furthermore, Xu points to the absence of an efficient market mechanism (again, a result of the disconnect between the corporate and household sectors) to balance the distribution of national income between consumption and investment. This shortfall means the household sector is unable to influence corporate dividend policies, resulting in excessive corporate savings and overinvestment. What they are trying to say is that consumers are too weak and corporations don't want to reinvest because they lack demand. Time for enterprises to increase wages...if they don't the CCP will do its job and regulate the economy.

Nice call.

https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/education/article/3258541/hong-kong-universities-rise-newly-published-global-subject-rankings-driven-positive-employer?module=top_story&pgtype=homepage More than 50 per cent of subjects offered moved up the rankings in a newly published global league by Britain-based education information firm Quacquarelli Symonds City’s four public universities included in league table for data science and artificial intelligence programmes, with Hong Kong University of Science and Technology in top 10

Owning military stocks is the best play here probably if you think it will escalate in the next 5 years. With that you will outperform everyone.