Reply #31: The Bull Market is Dead! Long Live the Bull Market! (in China)

[54anickel]

Interesting pic in this article.

http://www.bullnotbull.com/temp/over.html

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Since those shocking lows in October 2002, the world seems to have returned to a certain sense of normalcy for most people, albeit a different, numb kind of normal. Once again we have to work for a living. No more day trading, CNBC, or retiring on stock options. And if the stock market has failed to register the 20% + annual gains of the last few years of the twentieth century, it has also managed to avert more of the surprising declines that characterized the opening of the twenty first. War is a reality. Thankfully, there have been no more terrorist attacks at home, and we've all gotten used to ignoring the false terror alarms put out by the new Ministry of Homeland Security. Likewise, we've gotten used to being searched, prodded and poked when we travel by air, though we grumble under our breaths at the inconvenience of it all (but only under our breaths - this is a different America). Even the market managed to score some decent gains again. The start of the war in Iraq in spring of 2003 marked the end of the declines, at least temporarily. The Dow regained most of its former glory (91% of it), and is still hanging in above 10,000. And if the SPX and NASDAQ did not do quite as well in absolute terms, they did manage spectacular rallies from their all time lows that would make any bull proud (see Table).

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3. Turn and face the strange changes

A friend and colleague of mine who is a professor of Venture Capital and Entrepreneurship at National Chiao Tung University here in Taiwan emphasizes over and over to his graduate students that big changes create big opportunities. From his perspective, the dot.com boom and bust was necessary, and served its purpose; 10 years after the debut of Windows 95, the world is a different place thanks to new information communications technologies (ICT) that have emerged. They were invented during the boom; now their full potential is finally being put to use around the world. While only a small number of the bubble-era companies survived the bust, the outlines of the colossal changes that they are creating can already be seen taking shape.

As Americans, we tend to think that we are at the center of the universe and always will be, and the insular, corporate controlled media does nothing to dissuade this idea. But the world is a big place, and big changes are in the air. Just take one whiff of the howling winds, and I dare say that you can smell the changes, rolling in like a storm. You may be able to ignore them for a little while longer, but nothing can stop them. While the Corporate press keeps the American public entertained with politics and war, it smugly pooh-poohs China's growth as a bubble. But the optimism that hangs in the Asian air is as palpable as the pollution that clouds its skies. Shanghai is a city on the move and people in the daily course of their lives walk so fast down the streets of the city that they are running! America may still be the best place for ideas, but Asia has emerged as the best place to finance, produce and realize them.

As an American living in China for the past year (to be specific, the Republic of China on Taiwan), the world is starting to look a little different to me. There is no doubt that America is an empire and it still exercises its economic and cultural might (more on this in the future). But in China, a baby giant has been born, and he is hungry and he is growing. There is a new game in town, and it is played by international rules. Open your eyes - the bull market is dead! Come learn the new game or risk being left behind. Change creates opportunity. Long live the bull market!

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