|
PureBytes Links
Trading Reference Links
|
Dear RT,
A friend sent me the following which I thought would be of interest
to many of you.
Enjoy,
Norman
HONG KONG, Jan 25 (AFP) - Investors must strive to avoid the
"teeth" in the coming Chinese Year of the Tiger if they are to
survive further turbulance on the financial markets, according
to
predictions by Chinese geomancers released by Credit Lyonnais
Securities Asia.
The predictions are contained in the seventh Credit Lyonnais
Securities Asia "Feng Shui" index released to coincide with the
new
lunar year.
The Year of the Tiger will be a volatile period dominated by
fire and earth and negatively affected by three other elements
wood,
metal and water, the report says.
Feng Shui is the ancient Chinese practice which seeks to
maintain harmony between the elements.
"Safety first" is the prescription of the best geomancers in
Hong Kong and the CLSA consulatants who put together the Feng
shui
index.
"The theme that repeatedly comes up is a warning that things
will be worse than what they where in the last quarter of
1997,"
which was marked by among other things, the stock market crash
in
Hong Kong in October.
On a scale of luck running from plus four to minus four, the
curve traced by the index predicts a "very difficult" first
half of
the year for Hong Kong
The month of the horse (June 8 to July 7) will be critical
--
heralding a second half of "very great volatility" when tension
will
rise in the territory, triggering chain reactions, a wave of
crime
and new social crisis.
"If the Hong Kong dollar peg is removed, it will happen this
month -- a small crisis in a certain place will trigger chain
reactions and cause damage to major bourses around the world,"
the
report says.
Things will only improve "near the end of the year when the
savage cat finally runs out of energy," the report says.
Launched in 1992 as a CLSA new year greeting card, the Feng
Shui
index anticipated the volatility on the Hang Seng index in Hong
Kong
-- unlike many brokers and investors.
Each year, a CLSA greeting card, "embarrasingly seems to
capture
a little more attention than it should from the international
investment community, much to the dismay of our hard-working
analysts," the CLSA says.
But even so CLSA, the Asian brokerage arm of the Credit
Lyonnais
group warns investors to look on the index in the
tongue-in-cheek
spirit in which it is meant.
For the year of the Ox which is just ending, the Feng Shui
index
"perfectly tracked" the meteoric rise of the Hang Seng index up
to
Hong Kong's handover to China in July then "it perfectly
tracked the
Hang Seng ... in reverse" the CLSA said.
The geomancers had also predicted "a war or disaster in
emerging
markets," in its main predictions. "War there wasn't but
disasters
we had aplenty," according to CLSA.
"In 1998, the disaster will spread to developed countries as
newly jobless (or bonusless) expat Asian brokers move back to
the UK
and the US."
April and May are seen as the worst months for Southeast
Asia,
"as the countries' economic woes culminate in public unrest as
well
as disease."
The report, compiled before the latest sensational
allegations
broke about President Clinton and White House intern Monica
Lewinsky, predicts "the White House will be plagued by numerous
scandals, and the health of Bill Clinton and his family will
also
become a cause for concern."
And for the International Monetary Fund, "calmness will also
be
a great asset, allowing the Bank of Last Resort to shrug off
the
criticisms that will come raining down -- the year should end
on a
higher note for the IMF (somebody actually enacts one of its
reforms?), but it will be cold comfort after a brutal 1998."
|