The Perfect Storm

    Yesterday, I went for the Morgan Stanley Investor talk at Ritz Carlton for investors with the bank, at the invitation of my friend, Mr. Roland Teo. In it, there were speeches from expert investment bankers covering the EU. Asian and American economies. Judging from their comments, the perfect storm is approaching the worldwide marketplace, and unless some major new business idea or product captures the world's consumers, we are in for a dreary, or several quarters of economic decreases, ie. recession.It might be even longer than 3 quarters, what with Singapore being such an open and vulnerable economy and it hasn't a large enough population to sustain and grow startups to the size of huge or even mid sized countries like Thailand or Indonesia. We always have to startup, and migrate the model overseas in order to achieve a sustainable revenue stream for the long run.

     I said the 'R' word, and in a nutshell, the Asian region (excluding China) has decreasing exports to the EU, decreasing exports to the US and decreasing exports to China. So what does one do, in the age of uncertainity ? Hide one's head in the ground like the ostrich and wait for the economies to tank, not spend anything and live like a hermit ? One can be tempted to think and do so, but think about it, the world is based on laissesz faire economic principles of demand and supply, so if there is no or ever shrinking demand, then supply will shrink, and suppliers will wind up or go bust, banks would not be able to end, and prices will rise, leading to even lower demand, and hence an 'cycle of doom'.

      There must be some forward thinking, development of new platforms for the marketplace of billions, the last being the Social Media, before that was the handphone explosion, and even before that was the Dotcom boom and bust. So, what is the NEXT BIG THING ?

      Perhaps as my friend, Tom Gan, put it, it could be the unveiling of 2 key  entertainment devices,

a) Ultrabooks

b) Iphone 5 

       Will the world wind down with the possible unravelling of the EU ? When will the contagion hit the Asian economies, will China experience a hard or soft landing ? Will India be the next global growth engine or not ? Will there be a Quantitative Easing 3 (QE3) ?

       I don't have the answers, as the Governments of the world are doing all they can to shore up funds to help the banks,and lower interest rates, so as to ensure liquidity in the market. But this will only stave off a bigger economic calamity because all bonds and IOUs eventually have to be paid, with interest, and the debt ties everybody in one way or the other.

       In my opinion, the next year or 2 will be the most challenging ever faced by the South East Asian regions economically. So, we all have to be adaptable and survive in this perfect storm. My guess is to minimise debt, borrowings, continue business in whatever way to survive and seize good bargains as and when the sxxx hits the fan.

      Ths Chinese coin the word 'wei qi' as crisis, inside the word, there is 'ji' which is short form for 'ji huei'  or opportunity. So look for the opportunity in the crisis, and take the hits as and when they come.

      Seize the Opportunity !