Pass the Books. Hold the Oil.
Thanks to Andrew for passing this along.
EVERY so often someone asks me: “What’s your favorite country, other than your own?”
I’ve always had the same answer: Taiwan. “Taiwan? Why Taiwan?” people ask.
Very simple: Because Taiwan is a barren rock in a typhoon-laden sea with no natural resources to live off of — it even has to import sand and gravel from China for construction — yet it has the fourth-largest financial reserves in the world. Because rather than digging in the ground and mining whatever comes up, Taiwan has mined its 23 million people, their talent, energy and intelligence — men and women. I always tell my friends in Taiwan: “You’re the luckiest people in the world. How did you get so lucky? You have no oil, no iron ore, no forests, no diamonds, no gold, just a few small deposits of coal and natural gas — and because of that you developed the habits and culture of honing your people’s skills, which turns out to be the most valuable and only truly renewable resource in the world today. How did you get so lucky?”
That, at least, was my gut instinct. But now we have proof.
- Links
Phil DeMuth's Daily Journal Annual Meeting Notes, Part 4 (LINK) Atul Gawande's conversation at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health (video) [H/T ValueWalk] (LINK) [Related books, HERE.] Elon Musk’s Ex-Wife on What It Takes to Be a Mogul...
- Teenage Angst: The Implications Of China’s Slowdown
CHINA, an ancient civilisation, is still in its economic adolescence, a phase marked by growth spurts and mood swings. Other emerging economies endure this awkward period in relative obscurity, attracting only cursory attention. China has no such luck....
- Australia’s Mining Bonanza Is Over, Resources Minister Says
Found via Naked Capitalism. Australian Resources Minister Martin Ferguson said the nation’s mining boom has ended as BHP Billiton Ltd. (BHP) delayed approval of its Olympic Dam expansion that Deutsche Bank AG estimated at A$33 billion ($34.7 billion)....
- World In Upheaval: Apollo Asia Fund: The Manager's Report For 1q2011
Activity during the quarter was light: we added modestly to three holdings, trimmed four, and completely sold out of one very small stake. Our additions were mainly in Japan; our sales mainly in Southeast Asia. In the short term this has done nothing...
- High Yield Reads - 9/14/14
Summary of recent stories of interest, sometimes enduring, to investors. Jason Zweig - Fireside Chat with Charlie Munger. "Knowing what you don’t know is more useful than being brilliant."A Wealth of Common Sense - "The Best and Worst Things About...