Jim Rogers on China: Keep the Faith

It was a rough year for China bulls like Jim Rogers, who as an author and investor has long championed the world’s No. 2 economy. In 2012, China endured a series of corruption scandals involving princelings such as Bo Xilai, the purged party boss of Chongqing. At the same time high-profile fraud allegations aimed at Chinese companies shook investors’ confidence. Growth slowed as the country’s exporters felt the pinch of slumping demand in Europe. The Shanghai composite benchmark index was down about 2 percent as of Dec. 18, among the world’s worst performers for the year.

All that wasn’t enough to discourage Rogers. In 2007 he moved to Singapore with his wife and two young daughters so the girls could learn Mandarin and attend Chinese-language schools. His advice: Stick with the country but be patient. Very patient. “People who sold America in 1912 may have looked good for a while, but over the next 90 years or so they looked pretty foolish,” says Rogers, 70, who co-founded the Quantum Fund with George Soros in 1973. “That’s my view of China.”