Jim Rogers - Follow The Money $$$

Full transcript: Jim Rogers on London Real

9:40 Brian Rose: This is London Real. I am Brian Rose. My guest today is Mr. Jim Rogers, who is an American businessman, investor, and author. You’re currently based in Singapore.

9:48 We went from Yale to Wall Street in 1964 and later co-founded the Quantum Fund with George Soros in 1973, where I think in 10 years you guys had returned something like 4,200% compared with the S&P at, say, 47. That’s a lot. If you’re not in the finance world, it’s pretty much a legendary fund, what you guys did there. I think it returned something like $32 billion before they closed it down to its original investors.

10:17 Jim Rogers: I’ve been gone since 1980, so I left 34 years ago.

10:20 Brian Rose: Right, you probably don’t remember those numbers.

10:22 Jim Rogers: One slight correction, I didn’t go from Yale to Wall Street, I went from Yale to Oxford, and then. And then to Wall Street, Oxford in 66. And then the Army, and then Wall Street.

10:30 Brian Rose: Okay, I wanna get your thoughts on England back in 66, but I’ll just finish your introduction.

10:34 You motorcycled over 100,000 miles through China and the rest of the world in the early 90s, and later rode the best seller investment biker, which I first heard about when I started Wall Street, I’ll tell you about that later. About 10 years later, you made a similar trip, this time in a Mercedes, but you went to 116 countries, 250,000 kilometers, and a great looking car, it was yellow. It was fantastic. You now manage, I believe it’s a commodities equities index fund, is that right?

11:02 Jim Rogers: I don’t, I have a commodities index, but I don’t manage any funds. I license it to other people, and they have funds.

11:08 Brian Rose: Understood, I know you are quite bullish on agriculture. You recently said the farmers are going to be driving the Lamborghinis and the stock brokers are going to be driving the tractors. Jim, thanks so much for being here and welcome to London Real.

11:22 Jim Rogers: I am delighted to be here, Ryan.

11:24 Brian Rose: I started my Wall Street career in 93. I worked for Bankers Trust. I was a fixed income derivatives trader and I remember hearing about your book. I started in 93.

11:33 It must have just come out in 94 and I saw a picture of the cover. Your hair is a slightly darker color. It was a while back, but it was kind of legendary in the trading community. A lot of people were talking about it because I don’t think there were that many people going on these crazy adventures that had been in the business. And I was wondering if you could tell me, what do you learn on the back of a motorcycle that you can’t learn, say, reading a balance sheet or watching CNN?

12:00 Jim Rogers: I’m not gonna learn much watching TV, I assure you, no matter what the program. Well, you see the world from the ground up. There’s no question. You see what’s actually happening, not what journalists are saying, not what writers are saying. When you’re close to the ground, you see a whole different world.

12:16 You see whether a country is being organized properly, whether there’s a black market, whether it’s corrupt, you see everything there is to see. It’s not secondhand when you drive around the world, either by motorcycle or by car.

12:28 Brian Rose: I’m actually reading Zen in the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance now, and he talks about how even on a motorcycle, you’re forced to really deal with the weather, and you feel it more than even in a car where it can seem a bit like a television channel.

12:41 Jim Rogers: Yeah. When you’re in a car, you’re in a box. It certainly is a television show. You might as well be at home watching it on TV if you’re in a car or a truck or something. If you’re in a motorcycle, you’re right out there in it.

12:54 You’re part of it, which is exhilarating and exciting and very, very, it’s a wonderful way to travel and live. It’s a great adventure. That’s why I loved motorcycles so much. That’s why I wanted to go around the world in a motorcycle because I knew I would see at all, which I could never see any other way. Right.

13:11 Brian Rose: And you were one, I mean, so many people went into China early, so many people got burned on China early, people tried to understand it later, had a hard time even trying to re-figure it out again. What’s your relationship been like with China? Was that the first time you were there, was driving your bike through there?

13:30 Jim Rogers: No, I first went to China in 1984, I went to China in 1984 to get permission to ride my motorcycle across China. They actually sort of thought I was a little nuts to even come an American capitalist to read China in 1984 to say, could I ride my motorcycle across China?

13:45 And they of course said no. First of all, they said there’s no road. And they were right. I now know they were right. There was just a gigantic desert.

13:52 But I went around to various parts of China and asked more people. In 1986, they let me drive around one province on a motorcycle. And they said, yeah, you can do it. And Channel 4 in the UK and PBS in America and Channel 7 in Australia decided to make a video, a movie of it, for TV. And so we had to delay it for a year because they got ready.

14:16 But off I went in 1988 and rode across China.

14:19 Brian Rose: And why China? You could have gone anywhere else in the world to do it. Why there?

14:24 Jim Rogers: Well, my plan, my hope was to drive around the world.

14:27 But if you remember the 1980s, China was red China. You know, the idea that you could ride across China was absurd. Likewise, the Soviet Union was the Soviet Union. So my plan was to drive across China and then get permission from Russia, the Soviet Union, and then go around the world. I mean, I look back on it and I must have been insane.

14:51 I didn’t have a clue what I was talking about or thinking about. But it all worked. I got permission to ride across China, we made the film, and then the Russians said, yeah, You can ride across the Soviet Union, too, and then I went around the world. That was the original plan. It took several years to implement it because of the Cold War and all the things, the geopolitics that were taking place at the time.

15:16 I didn’t want to be somebody who said, yeah, I drove around the world. And they said, what, you drove across Europe, you went to Australia, you rode across the US. That’s not… To me, that wasn’t going around the world. I mean, I had to do the world if I was going to do the world.

15:32 So it took a few years to get permission to do it properly.

15:35 Brian Rose: Do you ever have to explain to your daughters what it was really like back then when the Soviet Union was around and China was Red China? Because they probably don’t know what you’re talking about.

15:44 Jim Rogers: If I tried to explain it, they’re too young to even conceive of what I’m talking about.

15:48 Brian Rose: It almost sounds Orwellian when you try to describe it to someone.

15:51 Jim Rogers: Orwellian wouldn’t work with him. They’re too young. Right. They’re still too young. They wouldn’t know what that meant, you know.

15:57 Brian Rose: So you live in Singapore now. There was a quote from you that you said, if you were smart in 1807, you moved to London, if you were smart in 1907, you moved to New York City, and if you’re smart in 2007, you moved to Asia. Right. And I did. And you did.

16:10 Yes. And why Asia? And why now?

16:12 Jim Rogers: Well, in my mind, there’s a little question that Asia is going to be the 21st century, will be the century of Asia, whether we like it or not. And there’s certainly a lot of people who don’t like it.

16:24 You know, America’s the largest debtor nation in world history. The debts are going higher and higher. You can look out the window and see some more great debtors nearby, and they’re all getting worse and worse. The assets are in Asia. The largest creditor nations in the world are China, Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore.

16:44 That’s where the assets are. That’s where the drive is, the ambition. That’s where people work hard. Throughout history, there have been countries and continents which have risen in Poland. This is the Asian century, whether you like it or not, there’ll be plenty of setbacks in Asia, just as there were in America, as we rose, just as there were in the UK, as the UK rose.

17:08 But I don’t see any options, but Asia, and I want to prepare my children for the 21st century. I want to give them any legs up that I can. It’s not going to make them successful because they know Asia, because they can speak Mandarin, but it’s gonna give them a few advantages that they may or may not squander, but we’ll see.

17:27 Brian Rose: And did you want them surrounded in that kind of Asian work ethic, not to mention the language, just to see what it was like?

17:34 Jim Rogers: Oh yes, I certainly did.

17:35 And I wanted them to have Asian education, as you probably know. The Asian nations come out on top in all the education, the international education tests. The United States is not even in the top 20. So I wanted them to have the demanding, rigorous, advanced education. I didn’t know what I was saying.

17:55 I got to tell you, it’s unbelievably demanding, rigorous, and advanced. It’s much more than I expected, and sometimes I feel sorry for my daughters. Had more homework in two or three years than I had in 12 in the US. I see what they’re doing. I mean, I can see why the Asians come out on top in the test.

18:14 Jim Rogers: Will my daughter be better for it? I don’t know, but she’s certainly learning a work ethic, if nothing else.

18:20 Brian Rose: There was that book written called Tiger Mother, I think, about that. I think it was an Asian, Chinese mother in America, married to an American, and she was talking about how she raised her children with lots of homework, demanding a lot of them, no gold stars for showing up. Is that the kind of thing you see with your daughters?

18:38 Jim Rogers: Yes, it’s astonishing. I cannot tell you how rigorous and demanding, and this is Singapore. Now, Singapore always comes out in the top five, but so does China, the Chinese that I know. So it’s just like, I mean, Singapore copied China, China copied Singapore, you know, in Korea, all the Asian, not all, but certainly the Chinese Asian nations are this way. Well, the Japanese are the same, the Koreans are the same, you know, it’s in their genes.

19:08 Brian Rose: And you said that used to be America and Europe was the people that worked hard, right? And the people that were motivated and driven, you know, the immigration wave you talked about in the last century or two in America.

19:18 Jim Rogers: Sure, in the 19th century, at the end of the 19th century, we were flooded with immigrants who would do anything to come there and work there. They showed up with no money and became great successes, and even into the 20th century. This was what made America great.

19:30 We were a nation of immigrants. America and the American government gave people money to come to America, gave them land to come to America. Not they didn’t give them money, they gave them land to come to America, and a lot of people got on the boat. Can you imagine getting on a boat 150 years ago, you didn’t know anybody, the boat may sink. There’s a good chance the boat will sink.

19:52 You got there, you didn’t know what to do. And then many of them just got a horse and a wagon and went out into the wilderness. I mean, when they went to the wilderness, there was no McDonald’s out there. There was no Coca-Cola. There was no running one, no shops.

20:07 There was nothing. They were on their own. And yet a lot of people did it, and you know the rest of the story.

20:12 Brian Rose: Yeah. There’s a tenement museum in New York City where you can go, and you can go visit the tenements and you can see the stories of some of these Italian immigrants, Russian immigrants that would come over and, yeah, I mean, some of them never went home.

20:25 I mean, some of them never had contact with their families ever again.

20:29 Jim Rogers: No, I’m fully aware of that, yes, yes. I had a forebear who showed up. We don’t know where he is. Have no idea.

20:36 He was from Germany and who knows what happened to him.

20:39 Brian Rose: And is there any way for America to get this fire back or get this back? Or is it just, is it kind of an emerging issue? If you’re not the emerging economy, you’re not going to be hungry, you’re not going to be the underdog. Or is there a way, I mean, America’s education system is shocking and is there a way to get it back?

20:55 Jim Rogers: Well, no country in history that’s gotten itself into this kind of situation has gotten out without a crisis or a semi-crisis. No country’s ever said, okay, we’ve got a disaster on our hands. Let’s start over and do it right. that they’re always forced to change and usually when they change it causes great collapse and nobody really starts over the way they should. I don’t know no country in history that’s done it that way.

21:23 It’s always led to serious decline. I mean, yes, it’s wonderful living in the UK right now, but what the UK was a hundred years ago, a hundred and fifty years ago, I don’t think you’re ever going to see that UK again.

21:36 Brian Rose: It’s hard to fathom. I took a tour of the Tower Bridge in London, famous bridge from 120 years ago, and it used to have a pressurized water hydraulic system that would raise the gate, and it was highly complex the way the Victorians designed it.

21:50 It was top-notch engineering for that time, and the guy showed me in the corner, all of it had been replaced by a German motor, and the symbolism was shocking.

22:00 Jim Rogers: Yeah, you just said it all. I mean, as much as I love the UK, And I had some of my triumphs in the UK. I mean, that’s not what it used to be, as much as I wish it were.

22:11 Brian Rose: I watched the movie Gandhi the other day, just on a whim.

22:15 And it had been a long time since I saw it. And it was just fascinating to just kind of get walked through that entire subcontinent that is India. And I was just wondering if you could give us your takes on India. A lot of people compare it to China because of the populations. But it’s a completely different animal with infrastructure that doesn’t compare.

22:32 And I was wondering if you could walk people through. What is India, in your opinion?

22:38 Jim Rogers: Well, if you can only visit one country in your life, you should visit India because there’s no country that has the breadth and depth of culture and man-made sites and natural sites. I mean, the food, the languages, the religions. India is a constant, sensory feast.

22:55 The women are always winning the beauty contest. I mean, some great, brilliant entrepreneurs that have come out of India, men and women. No, it’s astonishing. But boy, as a place to do business or even to live, it’s a nightmare. I mean, there’s little infrastructure.

23:10 Education is hopeless. Fewer than half of Indians finish just stay in school till they’re 12 years old. No, it’s just, it’s a wonderful country to visit, but boy, unless you’re in bed or in cahoots with the right people, it’s very difficult to be successful in India, certainly for an outsider.

23:27 Brian Rose: Right, I was about to say, is there any way for an outsider to really invest in India or do you need to really be an insider?

23:34 Jim Rogers: Well, it’s easier to be an insider in India.

23:37 It’s easier to be an insider everywhere, but there are cases in America, in the UK, where outsiders have come in and have done very successful, become very successful. Not many that I know of in India, where that’s the case. Not in India as it presently is constructed. There’s a new governor, a new government. He may, he says there are a lot of the right things.

24:01 My problem with India is I’ve heard these right things said by politicians for decades and none of them come true. Now India’s had some great periods in its history. There’s no question. But even that India was not the India which exists on a map today. The India which exists today was pushed together by the British in 1947 in panic as they were trying to get out of there.

24:24 So this India has never existed. Will it continue to exist as it does now? I doubt it. It certainly hasn’t historically. I love visiting there, but it’s a tough place to live or do business.

24:38 Brian Rose: Have you tried doing business in the past there or investing in there?

24:42 Jim Rogers: I have invested there on the short side. I’ve actually invested on the long side a couple of times in India. Yes, I’ve never tried to do, I don’t try to do business anywhere. I’m more of a markets person than a company person.

24:56 Brian Rose: Okay, back to Asia. You live in Singapore. You’ve seen China kind of growing and making a few pseudo-military moves on some islands in some of the South China Sea, and you see them kind of flexing their muscles a bit on a political stage. I was wondering, where do you think that’s going in the next 20, 30, 40 years? Is that even in their interests, or should they keep doing what they do great right now, which is making products for the world?

25:16 Jim Rogers: To me, it’s astonishing that the world may come to an end over a few rocks in the ocean, but having said that, if you go back and look at how most wars have started, they’ve always been absurd. A tiny little incident, right? Yeah, the one incident, then this guy does that, and that guy does that, and the next thing, you know, the First World War is a perfect example. You know, six months later, they were all saying, how do we get into this? How do we get out of this? But unfortunately, they couldn’t for whatever reason, because they’ve won the little incident, won the little incident, and the next thing you knew, you know, hundreds of thousands of people were dead, vast amounts of capital were squandered. That was a gigantic waste. But it was all because of a few foolish little things that got everybody going. But all wars. When you go back and look at them, get started that way, because politicians do foolish things. And the next thing you know, a bunch of 20-year-olds are shooting each other.

26:11 Brian Rose: How does the U.S. maintain this relationship where, you know, their biggest creditor is say China. China’s producing all of the goods for the U.S. You’ve got Japan in the region. You don’t want people fighting to continue the economy growing, but you’ve got a lot of conflicting interests here.

26:28 How does the U.S. manage that?

26:30 Jim Rogers: We will see. So far badly. Well, I shouldn’t say badly because it’s worked so far.

26:37 We’re not at war, and we’ve got all this credit that we keep getting from other people, and we keep going about our business as though we don’t have big credit. We don’t have big debts. You can ask me in five years or 10 years how it’s all going to come out. America’s not changed its conduct. Well, maybe it’s changed its conduct a little bit, but virtually not at all, despite the fact that we’re the largest debtor nation in world history.

27:04 Brian Rose: And what sectors in China are you bullish on for the future?

27:09 Jim Rogers: Well, the Chinese say that they had a big meeting in November of 2013 in Beijing, And they say it’s one of the three most important economic events in China in the past 35 years. The first was when Deng Xiaoping in 1978 said, this didn’t work. We got to try something new. And in 1993, they said, OK, now we got to engage the outside world more.

27:35 Well, both of those changes led to staggering changes in the world, not just in China. And now they said, all right, the next 20 years, this is where we’re going to put our money and our efforts and our incentives, but if the Chinese government is going to spend a lot of money on some sectors of their economy, I am too, because they got more money than I do. They’re smarter than I am, more successful than I am. So certainly things will come of it, and all you got to do is get out the list.

28:04 So it’s public information. I don’t have any inside information here. They’ve told you we’re going to spend a lot of money. But one thing they did say, they said, we’re going to, if there’s a question, we’ll let the market decide how things should evolve. It’s in sharp contrast to the US and the UK and other places, but they said, no, no, no, the government is smarter than the market.

28:25 We don’t want the market to decide because we’re smarter than the market. Well, the Chinese, red China, has said, we’re going to let the market decide and they’re going to let, they’re already letting people go bankrupt, which in the West, we hardly let anybody go bankrupt, health care, they say we’re going to open up to the market, railroads they’ve said, agriculture, they’ve said all the places that you can get out the list, finance, they’re going to open up finance, they said these are the things where there will be dramatic changes in the next 20 years. Get out the list, they’re right there.

28:58 Brian Rose: Which is hard to believe because it’s known as the communist country, where things are decided by government, but you’re saying it’s actually more free market than say health care in America.

29:09 Jim Rogers: I will say to you that I know many people who’d rather do business in China than in the US, yes, because in the US, especially some of the states like California and the US, it’s a nightmare, an absolute nightmare in many ways to do business and so many people would prefer to do business in China than in many states in the US. I mean, I hate saying this, I’m an American citizen and taxpayer, but unfortunately facts are facts.

29:33 Brian Rose: Yeah, those two go together pretty much, right, unless you renounce on both of those as well. You must get asked advice all the time about doing business in China. Is there things that you tell people, a few simple steps of things to watch or not? Or has that changed probably in the last five years?

29:50 Jim Rogers: Well, it depends on how much you know. If you cannot speak the language and you don’t know the difference in Shanghai and Beijing, you better get a partner. You better get a Chinese partner who will help you, a trustworthy, reliable Chinese partner. But if you know a lot about it, you probably know better than I do what you should be doing in China. You will find the opportunities. There are a billion, 300 million Chinese. I mean, no matter what you are an expert in, whether if you know how to make towels, I promise you there’s a market in China for towels. No matter what it is you’re good at, they need it. It’s a rapidly growing economy, yes, but there’s still every opportunity you can think of if you’re good at something.

30:32 Brian Rose: You know, you’ve been talking a lot lately about commodities and agriculture something that that you’re that you’re very bullish on My grandfather was a farmer in Colorado and Arizona. He grew barley For Coors Brewing Company funny enough and I grew potatoes as well And he was one of those guys that you mentioned where early on in the in the US They would just give you land if you went west Yeah, because you know, they needed people just to go and it was the Wild West, you know

30:56 Jim Rogers: Well, they wanted people first to come to America, right? And then they wanted to go west and they gave a lot away

31:02 Brian Rose: and why is that a sector that you see a lot of growth?

31:05 And you’re bullish on I mean, you’re talking about farmers driving Lamborghinis, you know I’m an ex-banker myself and I would have never expected to see the flip side of that So what do you mean by that when you say that?

31:17 Jim Rogers: Well, first of all? Agriculture has been a terrible business for 30 years It’s been so bad that the world is now consumed more than it’s produced for the last decade then when you consume more than you produce, it’s got to come from inventory.

31:30 We built up big inventories over those 30 years, but now the inventories worldwide are near historic lows. So we’re running out of food. Worse than that, we’re running out of farmers. The average age of farmers in America is 58. That old.

31:47 In Japan, it’s 66. In Canada, it’s the oldest in recorded history. Australia, it’s 58. The highest rate of suicide in the UK is in agriculture. Millions or lots of Indian farmers have committed suicide in the past.

32:04 It’s a terrible business. The pay is near poverty level as well. For many reasons, it’s been a terrible business. At the same time, we don’t have any new people, young people are not becoming farmers. More people in America study public relations than study agriculture.

32:20 I mean, we don’t, we got the old people dying and getting out of the business. No young people coming in. What more do you need to know? Either we’re gonna, unless the price of agricultural goods and profits in agriculture go much higher. There’s not gonna be any food at any price.

32:36 Somebody has to go into the fields. Even when the fields are automated, somebody’s gotta do it. And if everybody’s dead and everybody’s studying public relations, where’s the food gonna come from?

32:47 Brian Rose: And will this be dominated by companies like Cargill and those huge conglomerates that they kind of run the food business. I think last time that I saw a documentary about buying like bacon in the U.S.

32:59 That it’s all supplied by basically three companies that do the majority of that.

33:04 Jim Rogers: Well, they’re certainly going to be big companies and successful companies, but the U.S. is not the only producer of food in the world. I may astonish some people to know that. Vast numbers of farmers in agricultural areas around the world.

33:18 Some companies will get bigger and more successful, but also there is plenty of opportunity for entrepreneurs and people starting out.

33:26 Brian Rose: Okay, Russia. What is your call on Russia? Obviously it’s been pretty exciting lately with the things happening in the Crimea Peninsula, in Ukraine, you know, we kind of see, you know, you mentioned the Cold War earlier, we kind of see Russia kind of getting back to where it needs these buffer zones around it. There’s a lot of things on the line.

33:45 There’s oil and gas. There’s, you know, global politics involved with the US. What’s your read on what’s happening there?

33:53 Jim Rogers: Well, I first went to Russia in 1966 and came away pessimistic on the Soviet Union and was pessimistic for the next 46 years. But I have begun becoming more optimistic about Russia, not the former Soviet Union, because Ukraine’s a disaster and will be and many of the other socialist states are not going to be successful.

34:15 But I’ve become optimistic about Russia. I’ve started investing in Russia. Russia’s probably the most hated stock, second most hated stock market in the world. Argentina may be even more hated, but it’s got vast natural resources, vast financial resources. It’s got a freely convertible currency.

34:36 I’ve started investing in Russia because I see what I think is change that’s available at a cheap price.

34:44 Brian Rose: And what didn’t you like at 66? Were you at Oxford here and you took a triple?

34:51 Jim Rogers: I just finished Oxford And the summer after graduating from Oxford, I took a trip to East Germany, to Poland, Czechoslovakia, Ukraine, Russia. Yeah, we did several social estates.

35:05 Brian Rose: That’s before the Prague uprising in 68 where things started getting really dicey.

35:09 Jim Rogers: This was early on, yes, yes.

35:10 Brian Rose: What was it like? I’m just curious, what do you remember seeing?

35:13 Jim Rogers: What I remember seeing was nothing.

35:15 Brian Rose: It didn’t have anything. They hadn’t built up since the wars or?

35:20 Jim Rogers: No, no, no, I mean, listen, communism can ruin anything. Communism certainly ruined Russia, but I mean, when I came to the UK in 64, there were still bomb sites. I mean, the UK was devastated, and you didn’t even have a battle…

35:36 There was no battlefield here, but the UK was in serious trouble, and it was 20 years after the war had ended. They still had not recovered very much.

35:44 Brian Rose: Yeah, I had Jared Diamond here who wrote the book Guns, Germs, and Steel, and he was also at Oxford, I think around the same time you were, and he was trying to explain to me that a lot of homes were still lit by candlelight, there still wasn’t a lot of food supplies, and like you said, there wasn’t even a battleground here, and that’s 20 years after World War II.

36:02 Brian Rose: It devastated the British and European economies, didn’t it?

36:06 Jim Rogers: Certainly, of course, if you were in Italy or Germany, you were certainly French, you were devastated. But the UK, which in 1918 was still the richest, most powerful country in the world, three generations later they were ruined. Even one generation later they were in serious trouble, and this country was a mess when I was here in the 60s, even into the 70s. It was a horrible mess, and they never quite … well, they certainly didn’t recover for 20 or 30 years, because as I say, there were bomb sites here where they’d been bombed in 1944. They’d never been able to rebuild it or just clean out the debris. No, when I went to Oxford, I mean, there was only one shower. I mean, it was, looking back on it, it was somewhat primitive, certainly, compared to where I went to university in the States.

36:57 Brian Rose: Why did you come over here and go to Oxford?

37:00 Jim Rogers: Well, I wanted to avoid the draft for one reason.

37:04 Brian Rose: That’s a good reason.

37:06 Jim Rogers: It didn’t work. The secret reason was there was something here called the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Rice.

37:14 And I very much wanted to be. I had delusions of grandeur. I wanted to be in the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Rice.

37:20 Brian Rose: Did you row at Yale?

37:21 Jim Rogers: I coxed at Yale.

37:22 And when I got here, I found out, guys, this is crazy. This is absurd to try to get into the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Rice. But I did. I got into the Oxford-Cambridge boat race and had a wonderful, wonderful time. But that’s why I wanted to come … well, also I wanted to have experience outside of the US.

37:41 I had learned. I grew up in the backwoods of Alabama, and I had learned that the dramatic education of going far away from home to school, that’s the best part of education. So going from the backwoods of Alabama to Yale was mind-boggling. Opened me up to a lot of stuff, and I knew that if I studied abroad, I would have the same kind of experience. Rudyard Kipling once wrote a poem called The English Flag, and in there there’s a line which said, what can he know of England who only England knows?

38:20 Well I knew that. I knew that if you knew, if you left Alabama, you’d know a lot more about Alabama. I also knew if you left America, you’d know a lot more about America by going somewhere else. You can go back or not go back, depends on what you want, but at least you’re going to learn a lot. So I very much wanted that experience of studying outside the United States.

38:41 I wanted to avoid the draft. I wanted to be in the Oxford-Cambridge boat race. So off I went. I got a scholarship from Yale and off I went.

38:49 Brian Rose: Did you manage to avoid the draft or not?

38:51 Jim Rogers: No, no. I was in the United States Army. I spent two years. I came back from Oxford, I was in the Army for two years. Okay.

38:59 Brian Rose: You were born in Baltimore. Yes. You grew up in Alabama. Yes. You’re the first guest ever on the show to wear a serious sucker suit.

39:05 Looks beautiful. Thanks. A lot of people over here don’t understand the South or Southern charm or don’t understand a lot of basics because they never visited again, like you said. What do you know of England if you haven’t left? What is the South really like or how do you describe it to foreigners who’ve never been there?

39:22 Jim Rogers: Well, I’m not sure there is a South any more, given that the world has changed so much and that television has leveled everything. When I went to Yale in 1960, I really had trouble understanding them and they had trouble understanding me, even though I didn’t have a deep Southern accent. When my brother went 16 years later, he’d grown up on TV. So he spoke like they did. But he had a TV accent.

39:52 And so the very fact that we have television and movies and everything else, which has pretty much leveled a lot of the differences in the north, the southeast, and the west. There are still differences, as you know, but it’s nothing like it used to be. And flu differences, music differences, racial differences, they’re not nearly as significant as they were 50 years ago, 40 years ago.

40:17 Brian Rose: When you told your family you were going to Yale, did you get a lot of flack for that?

40:22 Were they like, why are you going up with those Yankees? Because there still was a lot of animosity between North and South back then.

40:30 Jim Rogers: Well, my father certainly said, I remember he was saying, you’re off to a real hotbed of liberalism going to New Haven. And he was worried about it because he certainly thought, and it was true to many, to much extent, that the Ivy League was a lot different, and Ivy League professors were a lot different. But of course, many people in that time of year was conservative compared to what some universities and some sectors of the Northern economy or the Northern society were.

41:00 Brian Rose: Besides the accent, do you remember culturally any really big differences between the Northerners and yourself?

41:05 Jim Rogers: Yeah, everything. I mean, simple. I remember a guy once saying, you know, it feels like snow. I said, what is he talking about that it feels like snow?

41:12 I’d never seen weather like that, you know, the way they dressed, everything. Many of them were much more sophisticated experience. Many of them had traveled to Europe or other places. They knew about all kind of stuff that I didn’t art, everything. I didn’t know much about anything when I got there.

41:32 Brian Rose: You know, you started on kind of on Wall Street, you know, before, you know, Wall Street was the place where everyone went, you know, to make a lot of money and to really push it. You kind of see technology these days as kind of the place where you go to be kind of the rock star and make these huge multiples. You could argue that was Wall Street in, say, the 80s or 90s. You know, you’ve seen it for so many decades. How has Wall Street changed from, say, 70s to 80s to 90s to the naughties from your perspective?

41:59 Jim Rogers: Well, historically, we’ve had long periods when the financial types were in charge, followed by long periods when the people who produced real goods were in charge. And then the financial types come back. When I was in, went to Wall Street, and when I was at Oxford in the 60s, it was the backwater. I mean, the New York Stock Exchange, who cared? A big day when the New York Stock Exchange was three million shares.

42:28 I mean, now, that’s not even a trade. You know, they do that before breakfast, they’ve already done it all over the world, millions of shares. So it was really a backwater, nobody wanted to go to Wall Street or the city of London. When I was at Oxford, my professors used to say, what’s wrong with you? Nobody cares about the city of London, it’s not significant to even the UK economy, why are you so interested?

42:56 Now, of course, every kid at Oxford wants to store a hedge fund in her dorm room or whatever. So it’s all changed dramatically. The 50s and 60s and 70s were, it was a wasteland, and along came the long bull market. And so we have everybody wanting to go to Wall Street, although you’re right. More and more of them are now trying to go into technology, because many people are starting to understand that the financial community has got problems, in my view it’s a terrible place to go, unless you really love it.

43:28 I mean, if you love finance and it’s your passion, then go. I didn’t know it was a bad place to go. I just loved it, you know? And I stumbled onto Wall Street. I said, oh my gosh, this is what I want.

43:40 This is fabulous. I mean, if somebody’s taken me aside, knowledgeable, he said, this is a terrible place to go for a career. But fortunately, nobody told me that, and I probably wouldn’t have listened anyway. It is a terrible place to go for a career now, but if you love it, go.

43:57 Brian Rose: You know, I watched the Asian crisis in like 97.

44:00 I’ve seen various emerging market crises when I was in the city. And one thing I noticed was it would always bounce back. You know, and you would always see things bounce back from crises, whether it be a South American country or whether it be Indonesia. But I was wondering, will the city bounce back? Will Wall Street bounce back to those levels in the 90s and the 80s with the big LBOs?

44:20 Jim Rogers: Not for generations. There are no UK investment banks anymore, merchant banks, they’re all gone, they disappeared, there were some great names once upon a time that they all disappeared, they’re either owned by the Germans or the Americans or somebody else. No, the city of London is already lost, I mean the city of London is still important, but it’s not British anymore, there are plenty of Brits down there. No, no, no, no. Great Britain, the UK is a huge debtor nation now, and the debts are getting worse and worse.

45:02 The North Sea oil is drying up. No, the UK is finished. I don’t particularly like saying it because I had a lot of great successes here, but unfortunately it’s finished.

45:12 Brian Rose: Would you read on technology now? Do you put your money into tech?

45:16 Would you put your money into tech when you look at Silicon Valley and the things that come out of there? What’s your gut feeling on that?

45:24 Jim Rogers: Well, I don’t know enough about technology to give you a decent answer. I don’t invest in technology. I periodically do on the short side because I don’t understand it and I really couldn’t tell you whether guys are doing great things or not.

45:37 I certainly see some of the stock prices. I certainly see some of the companies. Amazon has built a gigantic company. They don’t make any money but that’s my design. Is that the right way to go?

45:49 I don’t know. in 30 years, but I don’t buy those stocks mainly because I have no idea. I mean, somebody can come along tomorrow afternoon. Right now, they’re probably three 18-year-olds in a garage somewhere. Coming up with all sorts of companies that I don’t know about, won’t understand, and so I try to stay away.

46:07 Brian Rose: You seem to have kind of a medium term to long-term perspective on a lot of economic issues. I’ve heard you on a variety of interviews saying, look, we’re gonna have booms and busts in every economy, and you have to ride those out. Bankruptcies are good, And it seems like you’re always taking a bit more of a longer side of you than the latest news report that wants to lambast the ups and downs of the market. Is that fair?

46:30 Jim Rogers: Well, yes, it’s true, but it’s fair because maybe because I’m lazy, it’s easier to invest for the long-term than have to be sitting trade in front of a computer.

46:39 But I’ve been around long enough, and I’ve read enough, you know, history is a fabulous teacher about most sectors of the world, of anything. So I know that this has all happened before. I see how it works. I see how it has worked. And it’s gonna work that way in the future, I assure you.

47:00 Human beings are still the same. Still put our trousers on one leg at a time. We still get panicked when things go bad. We still get hysterical when things are going right, wildly excited and ecstatic. It’s all happened before.

47:16 Brian Rose: You know, you’ve written a book called A Gift to My Children, and I believe it’s some advice you’ve kind of decided to pass on to your daughters. And I was wondering if you could tell us a bit about that. And do you follow the Warren Buffett School of not giving any inheritance to your children?

47:33 Jim Rogers: It’s a good question, and I don’t know. I’m grappling with it. You know, Warren’s kids are, his kids are old and grown, and it’s easier for him to make that kind of decision. My kids are six and 10. So, yes, intellectually, yes.

47:49 I don’t wanna give them anything. Educate them and then, okay, now you’ve got your brains, you’re on your own and teach them all the things that I, to work hard, et cetera. Yes, that’s my view. I notice that Warren has certainly given his kids a lot more over the years and since they’ve gotten older, I have no idea how I’m gonna do it at the moment. intellectually I say don’t give them too much and I haven’t given them too much but Who knows? Yeah, it’s kids right now. It’s something to grapple with

48:18 Brian Rose: Yeah, I guess it’s easy for Warren to say because each one of his kids is almost established in their own industries Yeah, they each have a lot of money that he’s given him over the years, etc You know, and he’s now decided that one of his sons is going to be the chairman of the board Of the of his company. So I mean that’s not what Warren was saying 30 years ago What was in the book, A Gift to My Children, what were the themes that you wanted to pass on?

48:44 Jim Rogers: Well, it started because I had these kids, I’d never had kids, so I started thinking of things that I wanted to make sure that I taught them, and so I’d write them down. The next thing you knew, I had a magazine article or two, the next thing you know, it became a book of things. I’ve had plenty of mistakes that I’ve made, I’ve had a few triumphs, and I wanted to teach them in a book. I like to teach them and I do teach them, but if you have a book, it’s something they can always pick up one day and look at and say, what did my father teach me about that?

49:17 Whether I’m alive or not at that time, it’s always something that can have it right there. Oh yeah, now I see what he meant. The only way I know to make sure that that’s still around always and easily accessible is in a book.

49:31 Brian Rose: You you retired from Wall Street quote-unquote in 1980 and it looks like you’ve taken, you know breaks From now and then did you miss it when you were away from it because you took a big chunk of time off and did you find That you found things to do or was it difficult being away from those markets?

49:49 Jim Rogers: Well, I Haven’t had a job since 1980, but I’ve had to invest I mean, how am I gonna pay my rent if I don’t invest my money somewhere even if I just put it in a bank bank. That’s investing and getting the interest. You got to do something with your money. I guess I could turn it over to Sally or Bob, but I got to look after it. And because of the nature of who I am, if I’m riding around the world and I see great things happening, I could wave and keep going, or I could say, hey, look at that.

50:21 This is a phenomenal opportunity, and so I can stop and make an investment. So whether I like it or not, I still invest, A, because I have to, and B, because it’s still a wonderful, wonderful way to spend your time.

50:33 Brian Rose: That second trip where you went around the world in your bends with the trailer on the back, what was the most interesting part of the world at that time, because you went ten years later than your original motorcycle trip, what had changed and what was your favorite part of that trip?

50:49 Jim Rogers: Well, it changed dramatically. Russia was much more, first time I went around it was still the Soviet Union, you know, it was a disaster. The second time I went around, it was the Commonwealth of Independent States or whatever all those countries called themselves at that time, no, huge changes. China, same way, Africa, when I went through Africa the first time, everybody was a socialist or a communist. The second time, nobody wanted to be a communist, nobody wanted to be a socialist.

51:24 If they did, they wanted to be a rich socialist. Berlin Wall had fallen, all of that garbage had been discredited and everybody knew it. So everybody was trying to open up to the outside world and open their economies, their societies, everything. It was much, much better. Technology, of course, we had the computers and the internet, which did not exist 10 years ago.

51:50 They existed, but the idea that you would go around the world on a motorcycle with a computer in 1990 wasn’t even an idea, it was laughable. So the world had changed and is always changing. One of the things that I write about in my books is no matter what you think is true today, it’s not going to be the case in 15 years. You pick any year in history, 1900, 1950, and look at what everybody thought was the way the world is, 15 years later, enormous changes had taken place all over the world, no matter where you’re in, in society, in politics, in wars, economics, everything was enormously different.

52:37 Techni, what is this, 2014, I assure you, 2029, they’re gonna look back and say, how did they not see that the world was changing and it was going to be different 15 years later.

52:48 Brian Rose: Does that make you comfortable being a contrarian investor? Because you’re talking about investing in Russia when people are like, that’s the last thing. Does that reassure you when you think about, say, that 15 year time frame?

53:01 Jim Rogers: Well, it may be because I do have experience of seeing how the world has always changed and I know it’s going to change.

53:08 Now, listen, Russia may be collapsed in the next 15 years. I don’t know that it’s going to be what I think. It may go through the roof and then collapse, who knows? But I know that everything we think today is accurate is going to be different 15 years from now. And, of course, the key is to make sure you’re going the right way instead of the wrong way.

53:31 Brian Rose: Who do you listen to or watch on Wall Street as far as investment professionals or advisors? Is there anyone that impresses you? Or do you keep an eye on?

53:41 Jim Rogers: No, I’m pretty much a loner. I don’t have a TV.

53:44 I don’t pay attention to, I don’t speak to other people at all. I have found in my life that if I get an investment idea from somebody else, I nearly always lose money and I’m not quite sure why, so I have learned not to try. If you tell me to buy X, I promise you I’ll walk out of here and not think about it another time because I know that I’m probably going to lose money.

54:06 Brian Rose: It’s interesting because so many of those messages are subliminal and if you’re always constantly, if you’re even in a room where the television is on and at three different places you hear there’s a crisis, there’s a crisis, there’s a crisis, all of a sudden you’re behaving and investing or not investing like there is a crisis.

54:25 Jim Rogers: Right. No, as I said, I don’t have a TV.

54:27 Brian Rose: And do you, when you look south from the US and you see, say, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, that whole piece, you know, you look at the global economies. Is that something you stay away from right now? You know, a lot of commodities being produced in Brazil.

54:40 Jim Rogers: Not as a principle, I’d rather look to Asia than to other places, but then no, I’ve had African investments, I’ve had South American investments. At the moment, I’m mainly looking to Asia or to raw material commodities.

54:58 Brian Rose: Okay, and in Asia, are you still looking at Vietnam and a lot of the Southeast Asia as well, or is it pretty much China where you have your focus?

55:09 Jim Rogers: China, Japan, Singapore, these are places where I, Australia a little bit, where I have things.

55:17 I would like to invest in North Korea, but I’m an American, so it’s illegal. I’d like to put all of my money into North Korea if I could. North Korea is where China was in 1980, where Myanmar was in 2010. exciting and dramatic changes are taking place, but I’m a citizen of the land of the free and we’re not allowed to invest in North Korea. It’s interesting for me to see a place like North Korea.

55:44 Brian Rose: You talk about this hyper-connected world we’re in where everyone knows everything about everyone else. North Korea seems to be like the last place and maybe the last place in history that will ever be not connected or not developed or not saturated with capital.

56:01 Jim Rogers: Well, maybe that is even going to be the last place, because Korea has a great gene pool if you look at it historically over the past couple of thousand years. There’s something about the Koreans that they’re not dumb, unsuccessful people.

56:16 They’re certainly among the most isolated, but even that’s changing, that’s changing very quickly. The Russians are pouring in, the Chinese are pouring in, I’m sure there must be some countries in the world that are more isolated and backward than North Korea at the moment, but it’s changing very quickly.

56:33 Brian Rose: Yeah. You know, Jim, we always ask people on the program a few questions at the end. I’m going to hit you with these questions.

56:40 If you can make a phone call to the 20-year-old Jim Rogers, I guess that gentleman was in New Haven maybe at the time, and give him a bit of advice. What would you tell him?

56:52 Jim Rogers: Well, that’s interesting because I had so much fun at Oxford. I mean, if I’d been smart when I was 21, I would have gone to China and learned Chinese. If I’d been really smart when I was 21, I mean, I like every other 21-year-old and looking back instead of to the future and Oxford was Oxford, still is, so I went to Oxford.

57:14 I guess I would tell him, okay, go ahead and go to Oxford and do all that, but then After you get out of Oxford, go to China, you know, as soon as you can in that town. Now, I’m not even sure of that because I had a lot of fun on Wall Street and a success. And if I’d gone to China when I went to Wall Street, I probably would not have been able to retire when I was 37. But I guess I would say, okay, go to Wall Street, have your success, and then go to of China, instead of fiddling around in America for the next 30 years.

57:50 Brian Rose: Right. Well, you know, because investing, sometimes you can have the right investment idea, but you can be in too early. Or be too late. Oh yeah, many times. Right.

57:57 So maybe going to China in the late 60s was too early.

58:00 Jim Rogers: It would, yeah, I would have had to live through the Cultural Revolution, I probably would have been executed. So you’re right, it probably would have been too early.

58:08 Brian Rose: You mentioned retiring when you were 37. What was the response like when your book came out, Investment Biker, and the community and everything.

58:15 How was that received?

58:17 Jim Rogers: Well, I was surprised at how well-received it was. My publisher was publishing Marlon Brando, his biography at the same time, and the original publisher even said, it was a division of Brando, I said, I don’t want to publish this book. It’s not worth publishing after I turned it in and read it, although her reader thought thought it was great, but the woman for some reason thought it was useless and a waste and didn’t want to bother and wanted to split up in all of her time on Marlon Brando.

58:57 So another guy, the head of the company, in fact, said, no, this is a good book, I want to do it. And so Marlon Brando’s book sort of disappeared. And my book became a reasonably successful book, which apparently surprised her anyway, that lady who had her own imprint. And I had no clue. I had no clue what I was going to do.

59:17 I’d never done a book before. I just wanted somebody to read it and somebody to like it, and they did.

59:23 Brian Rose: And you wrote it all yourself.

59:25 Jim Rogers: Who else? Yeah, my mother.

59:27 Brian Rose: These days, you know, a lot of people have to do it.

59:32 Jim Rogers: No, let me, to clarify that. What I do is I dictate the book. Okay. And that started with a magazine article a magazine article, and we dictated a lot, and then another guy came and I dictated and dictated it.

59:50 So we had 2,000 pages, you know, and randomized it, you’re a wonderful person, we ain’t gonna publish 2,000 pages. So we had to edit and edit and edit and edit to get it down to a proper book size. But that’s how I do it, and people often say, gosh, your book size just like the way you talk. That’s why. Because I don’t just, I don’t write it, I tell the story.

1:00:17 And many people, Southerners especially, historically have been better at telling stories than most other things and certainly than other people. So I tell the story and then we transcribe it and then I edit, somebody else edits, we edit and edit and edit.

1:00:33 Brian Rose: Why is it that you Southerners have this charm, this hospitality and this way of telling stories that the Northerners just don’t have? Why? It’s not fair.

1:00:42 Jim Rogers: I don’t know if you ever read a book, a story called The Ice Palace by F. Scott Fitzgerald. And in there, there was a southern girl, and she went to the north and fell for this guy. I think he went to Princeton probably because it was Fitzgerald. And they were all engaged in big planning, a big wedding, et cetera.

1:01:07 And they had a party, and the family, the Northern family built an ice palace, and everybody was in there having this wonderful party. And after the party, she went to the guy and said, I’m breaking the engagement, I’m not going to marry you. And the guy said, why? And she said, I can’t live here. Nobody flirts, you know?

1:01:30 People are all cold. And I mean, Fitzgerald was one of his early stories, he said, but it’s all ice. It’s all cold, nobody has joy of living and nobody will flirt.” She said, none of these guys will flirt with me because I’m engaged to you and I don’t want to live like this, I want to go where people are laughing and giggling and flirtatious and so she left. And that describes the South a bit better. Well, that was F. Scott, as you may know, he married a woman from Montgomery and Montgomery, Alabama and so I guess he had a lot of insight into Southerners.

1:02:06 Brian Rose: Do you ever go back to the South and back?

1:02:08 Jim Rogers: Yeah. My niece is getting married Next month. No, I my mother died recently But I used to certainly go back at least once a year to see her take pictures take pictures with my children of their grandmother They won’t remember her but at least they’ll have lots of photographs. No, I yeah, we go back

1:02:25 Brian Rose: just finishing up that advice question What is the best advice you’ve ever received will cross your career, maybe it be business or maybe it be personal But there’s something coming along.

1:02:36 Jim Rogers: Well, probably follow the money. By that, I mean, if you figure out who’s going to make the money or who is making the money, you can pretty much figure out politics, society. You can figure out a lot of stuff, you know, a lot of people. Their hidden agenda or their agenda can be discerned and discovered if you really can figure out, okay, who’s going to make the money? Who is making the money? Who’s got the money?

1:03:08 Who wants the money? If you can follow the money, if you can figure out how the money is what’s happening, then you’ll figure out a lot of the real stuff that’s going on. Forget what the politicians say. That’s garbage, as I hope most people know by now. There’s a hidden agenda everywhere, and you’ve got to figure that out.

1:03:29 Because ultimately, the most political decisions are about some type of money flow going somewhere in the future, whether that be for their re-election campaign or who knows. The voters want it. The voters will support you. The lobbyists want it. You just got to figure out who’s going to get the money and why.

1:03:44 Don’t listen to what they say. Don’t listen to all their platitudes, either the political platitudes, politicians’ platitudes, or the lobbyists or the interest groups. They’re all trying to figure out how to get some of the money. That’s a famous line from the movie about Watergate when they finally found the guys and took Nixon down. It was follow the money, right?

1:04:06 Because they ultimately traced the money. I’m not the first person to figure out that you got to follow the money or figure out the money, but yeah, it’s been demonstrated many, many, many times in history, yes.

1:04:18 Brian Rose: Interesting. The last part of that question is to the 20-year-old that’s listening to us around the world whether they be in Australia or China or Brazil. What advice do you give to them if they want to…

1:04:30 Jim Rogers: Well the same thing I would say you must spend some time out of your own country no matter what it is. It’s better to learn a language these days especially in 2014. I would certainly urge you to learn any language. It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t have to be Chinese. Learn any language and certainly to spend some time out of your own country because you’re going to learn a whole lot more about your country, about yourself, especially about yourself if you have to live in a foreign country for a while.

1:05:00 So go. You’re going to learn about what you’re not good at, what you’re good at. You’re going to learn more about your personality. You’re going to learn about your own life, if you’ve got to go and eat different food or buy in shops that you’ve never seen before or transportation systems that you have no clue about. It’s going to make you learn a whole lot more.

1:05:20 You’re going to become much more self-reliant, that’s for sure, and you’re going to understand that the world’s very different from what you think it is, and that’s a very good star.

1:05:30 Brian Rose: That’s great advice, Jim. What’s next for you in the next few years, next five years? Is there another book in you? Is there another world tour?

1:05:37 Jim Rogers: No, I don’t think so. Right now what’s in is my two little girls. I was very much against children. I thought children were a horrible waste of time and energy and money. I felt so sorry for people who had children.

1:05:50 Brian Rose: I used to feel that way too. What changed you? What changed you?

1:05:55 Jim Rogers: Well, I was never going to do it. What changed me was I had one.

1:05:59 And then I said, oh my God, I was wrong. So I found out that I was absolutely, totally, unbelievably, 100% wrong. You were? About children. Yeah, absolutely.

1:06:08 Brian Rose: And what is the truth about children then?

1:06:10 Jim Rogers: Children are so… You learn a lot about yourself, you learn a lot about life, you learn a lot about other people. It’s astonishing how much you learn from it. I have emotions I didn’t know I had.

1:06:20 I understand my parents for the first time in my life. You know, I understand there’s this whole class of people out there that I knew nothing about parents. I knew nothing about these people called parents. Well, now I understand a lot, and a lot of them in the world. So no, no, my focus now is these two little girls.

1:06:39 Brian Rose: It’s amazing how when you don’t have children, you almost typify parents as almost these like, Not second-class citizens, but these stupid aliens. Like, why would you do that? Why are you showing me pictures of your kids? I don’t care. I don’t want to see them.

1:06:53 Jim Rogers: I’d walk into an airport, never see the children. Now when I walk through the airport, I see everybody’s children, you know? I’d go by in the park. I’d see parents with their kids. I’d say, those people must be so miserable.

1:07:06 Now I see them laughing and smiling and having fun. Now I see the world much differently now that I’ve had children.

1:07:13 Brian Rose: That’s a very good piece of advice. I was definitely like you until a couple years ago where I kinda got one by proxy. And yeah, I guess it’s empathy or you see things through their eyes.

1:07:23 You forgive your parents for a lot of mistakes they made.

1:07:26 Jim Rogers: Yeah, as I say, I’ve learned a whole lot about myself and about the world from having these little girls. So my next five years, my next 25, who knows, is devoted to these little girls as long as they’ll have. There’s gonna come a time when they’re gonna have nothing to do with me, I know.

1:07:41 Brian Rose: Yeah, that’s coming too, right?

1:07:43 Jim Rogers: I know that’s coming, as long as they’ll speak to me, I’m gonna be with them.

1:07:48 Brian Rose: Okay, and in the meantime, you’re still gonna be talking about the markets, you’re gonna be investing yourself. If people wanna learn more about this index, can you just tell us a little bit more about that and how they can find out more about what we’re doing?

1:08:03 Jim Rogers: Well, I came to the conclusion that the commodity bear market was gonna come to an end and I was about to go off around the world, so I figured I wanna invest in commodities, So I’m going to do it.

1:08:14 So I decided that I would come up with an index, I could put my money in the index while I was gone. And then if I was right and there was a new bull market, I would make money and I didn’t have to work too much. And even if I wasn’t right and the worst would happen, nothing would happen. So and it turns out that one of the few times in my life I got the timing almost perfectly And the index, in my view, the bull market in commodities is not over yet, and it’s got a few more years, if not more, to go.

1:08:46 So this is just a basket of, you know, you can buy the S&P 500 index, and that’s just a basket of stocks. Put your money in the basket, if the prices go up, you make money, if it goes down, you lose money. That’s what this commodity index is, it’s a basket of commodities. And if they do well, and so far, it’s outperformed all the other commodity indexes, because this was for my money. The other guys trade against their index.

1:09:18 I didn’t have any customers. This was for my money. This wasn’t for somebody else, so I guess that’s one reason it’s done better, to outperform the others.

1:09:25 Brian Rose: It’s funny you say it. Like a lot of guys that used to work on Wall Street don’t want their money anywhere near Wall Street traders, because they know, like you said, some guys will trade against the index that they’re selling.

1:09:36 Brian Rose: Is that something you walked away from Wall Street, being hesitant to give your money to?

1:09:42 Jim Rogers: Well, I’ve never given my money to anybody else, partially because I know that most people who invest don’t do as well as the average is. I mean, I’m not the first person to know that. It’s been proven many times by academics and consultants. So I know that most people don’t do as well as the indexes.

1:10:02 And second, I mean, I think I know a little bit about money. Why would I give it to Joe or Sally when I think I know something, and maybe even more than they do? So, no, I’d rather do it myself or put it in an index, which the studies show over and over that the index outperforms 70% or 80% of active money managers year after year after year. I mean, it’s a sad commentary, but it’s a fact.

1:10:29 Brian Rose: And what’s the name of your index?

1:10:31 Jim Rogers: The Rogers International Commodity Index.

1:10:34 Jim Rogers: Okay. Also, there’s the Rogers International Agricultural Index, Metals Index, but the parent is the Rogers International Commodity Index.

1:10:45 Brian Rose: Fantastic. And your website, is it jimrogers.com?

1:10:49 Jim Rogers: That’s where all the information is from. Not much there. It’s just that Rogers.com basically is my trip around the world, which is there for historic reasons. My public schedule is there, I’ve got to put it somewhere. That’s about all that’s there.

1:11:03 I mean, there’s no blog or anything that I maintain.

1:11:06 Brian Rose: Okay, and no more books, no more trips around the world. Your daughters are growing up, maybe you should take them around the world. Who knows? Who knows?

1:11:13 Jim Rogers: I never knew I’d do any books. I never knew I’d have any children. I never knew I’d live in Asia. So I can tell you, whatever you think is true, 15 years later, it’s going to be enormously different. It’s going to be incredibly different.

1:11:26 Brian Rose: Fantastic. I’m going to end the show. Jim, thanks so much for sitting down with us. It’s just a fascinating story And great to hear you read, you know on the whole world. So appreciate it. We say on London Real. It’s about the journey I wish you well on yours.

1:11:52 Jim Rogers: Thank you. It’s been fun. Thank you.